Trump brings DOGE fight over access to Social Security data to Supreme Court
By John Fritze, CNN
Washington (CNN) — President Donald Trump’s administration urged the Supreme Court on Friday to allow Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency to access Social Security Administration data on hundreds of millions of Americans.
The latest emergency appeal to reach the court involving the Trump administration followed a divided decision from the 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday that continued to block DOGE from accessing the information.
US Circuit Judge Robert King wrote that the data DOGE was seeking exceeded what “all but the few most experienced and trusted” at the administration itself are permitted to review. Access to the data, the Clinton appointee wrote, “contravened SSA policy and practices of access limitations and separation of duties.”
Nine judges voted to leave the lower court’s order in place and six dissented.
The lawsuit, filed by federal employee unions and a retiree association, is one of several that challenge DOGE access to closely guarded data systems across various federal agencies. DOGE has argued that it needs the data to implement “reform efforts” aimed at combatting fraud.
“The district court is forcing the executive branch to stop employees charged with modernizing government information systems from accessing the data in those systems because, in the court’s judgment, those employees do not ‘need’ such access,” the administration told the Supreme Court in its filing.
“The injunction involving the SSA does not merely halt the executive branch’s critically important efforts to improve its information-technology infrastructure and eliminate waste,” the administration continued. “District court control of decisions about internal access to information also constitutes inappropriate superintendence of a coequal branch.”
US District Judge Ellen Hollander in March described DOGE’s efforts as a “fishing expedition” that was “in search of a fraud epidemic, based on little more than suspicion.”
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