Supreme Court allows DOGE to access social security data

Summary

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Friday allowed members of the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency to access Social Security Administration data.The conservative-majority court, with its three liberal justices objecting, granted an emergency application filed by the Trump administration asking the justices to lift an injunction issued by a federal judge in Maryland.The unsigned order said that members of the DOGE team assigned to the Social Security Administration should have "access to the agency records in question in order for those members to do their work."The lawsuit challenging DOGE’s actions was filed by progressive group Democracy Forward on behalf of two unions — the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, and the American Federation of Teachers — as well as the Alliance for Retired Americans."This is a sad day for our democracy and a scary day for millions of people," the groups said in a statement Friday. "This ruling will enable President Trump and DOGE’s affiliates to steal Americans’ private and personal data."Follow live politics coverage hereLiberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote a dissenting opinion questioning the need for the court to intervene on an emergency basis."In essence, the 'urgency' underlying the government’s stay application is the mere fact that it cannot be bothered to wait for the litigation process to play out before proceeding as it wishes," she added.DOGE, set up by billionaire Elon Musk before his falling out with President Donald Trump, says it wants to modernize systems and detect waste and fraud at the agency. The data it seeks includes Social Security numbers, medical records, and tax and banking information.“These teams have a business need to access the data at their assigned agency and subject the government’s records to much-needed scrutiny,” Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote in court papers.The lawsuit alleged that allowing broader access to the personal informatio...