US federal judge finds Trump administration voter database unlawful – Jurist.org
A US federal judge found Monday that the Trump-Vance Administration unlawfully created a centralized voter database containing American citizens’ private information.
The database at issue was created after President Trump issued Executive Order 14248. Pursuant to the order, DHS and the SSA altered the existing Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) database to allow state and local election officials to verify the citizenship or immigration status of individuals registering to vote. In response, the League of Women Voters and several nonprofit organizations joined together to challenge the system’s legality, with plaintiffs alleging that it incorrectly identified some eligible US citizens as noncitizens, resulting in the denial or restriction of their right to vote.
Judge Sparkle L. Sooknanan of the US District Court for the District of Columbia sided with the plaintiffs and stated:
The Court agrees that the establishment of the SAVE modified system and the notices that followed are unlawful in several respects. First, they violate a prohibition in the Social Security Act against the disclosure of Social Security numbers and other related SSA records. Second, they violate both substantive and procedural protections in the Privacy Act, which prevent the non-consensual disclosure of certain information (both by federal agencies and between federal agencies) and require notice and comment for certain actions relevant here. Third, they violate the [Administrative Procedure Act].
The court stressed that the Trump-Vance Administration broke the law when they created a means to collect and share information through their SAVE system by improperly disclosing personal information from social security records, failing to place privacy protections and follow public notice requirements, and failing to comply with federal administrative law to implement the system.
The defendants may appeal the court’s decision.
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