This class-action lawsuit challenges the Trump-Vance administration’s unlawful creation of massive government databases consolidating sensitive and legally protected personal information on millions of people in the U.S., in an effort to enable a nationwide hunt for a vanishingly small number of non-citizens on the voter rolls. This unlawful data consolidation threatens to disenfranchise eligible, naturalized voters who still appear as non-citizens in certain stale government databases, subjects Americans to unwarranted investigations, and creates unprecedented security risks by placing sensitive, personal information in a single target-rich system.
The lawsuit asks the court to return the SAVE system to its status quo prior to the administration’s unlawful changes and to order the deletion of unlawfully collected data.
Plaintiffs: The League of Women Voters, League of Women Voters of Virginia, League of Women Voters of Louisiana, League of Women Voters of Louisiana Education Fund, and Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), along with five individual plaintiffs (J. Does 1–5)
Defendants: Kristi Noem, in her official capacity as Secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security; Amy Gleason, in her official capacity as Acting Administrator of the U.S. DOGE Service; Frank Bisignano, in his official capacity as Commissioner of the Social Security Administration; Pamela Bondi, in her official capacity as U.S. Attorney General
Case Status: The initial complaint was filed on September 30, 2025 in Washington, D.C., followed by a request for a preliminary injunction on October 7, 2025
The Unlawful Use of Legally Protected Personal Data
The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, details how the so-called “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE), the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Social Security Administration (SSA), and other agencies have secretly merged personal data from across the federal government into centralized “Interagency Databases” in direct violation of the Privacy Act of 1974 and the U.S. Constitution.
The complaint alleges that the administration has unlawfully:
Changes to the DHS’s SAVE System
A principal focus of the case is on the DHS SAVE system. This system, created in 1986 to verify immigration and citizenship status of immigrants, has now been linked to unreliable, stale, and incomplete SSA data on citizenship status. An increasing number of states are using the SAVE system and these newly enabled SSN-based queries (as well as the new capability to query in batches) to investigate their entire voter rolls for a vanishingly small number of non-citizens on the rolls.
In taking these consequential steps with Americans’ most sensitive data, the Administration did not comply with the Privacy Act, among other federal statutes, and the suit challenges those federal law violations.
Fair Elections Center Legal Team as Co-Counsel
The plaintiff coalition is represented by lawyers from Democracy Forward, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), and Fair Elections Center. Fair Elections Center previously investigated the recent modifications to the SAVE system and published its findings in an urgent issue brief released in July 2025, “Eligible Voters at Risk: Examining Changes to USCIS’s SAVE System.”
As the brief explains in detail, these recent modifications raise questions of accuracy, data reliability, lack of procedural clarity, and federal administrative overreach into election administration. This issue brief relies in part on information about SAVE and SSA that Fair Elections Center unearthed during its litigation challenging Arizona’s citizenship investigation procedures, including a subpoena response letter from SSA disclaiming the reliability of its citizenship data and deposition testimony from the USCIS officials who run SAVE.
Naturalized citizens are most susceptible to being wrongfully identified as non-citizens and removed from the rolls in error and without being given adequate notice or an opportunity to correct any potential misidentification resulting from state and local election officials’ misguided reliance on stale government databases. This preexisting risk has been turbocharged by the Administration’s recent changes to the SAVE system.
“The federal government’s secretive and unlawful collection and consolidation of Americans’ personal data is a clear example of the constitutional crisis we are living through,” said Celina Stewart, CEO of the League of Women Voters. “Our federal government is abusing its power to access American’s personal information, and several states are using that private data to harm voters and our individual right to privacy. The League is proud to be heading to court to protect voters, our members, and historically disenfranchised communities from illegal government abuse.”
“Virginians have a right to privacy in their data and protection from unlawful investigations and purges,” said Joan Porte, president of the League of Women Voters of Virginia. “The League is disturbed by this unlawful collection of our data, and we are proud to push back on behalf of our members because every Virginian deserves the assurance that their right to privacy and right to vote will be protected.”
“The consolidation and unlawful use of Louisianans’ sensitive data without our knowledge is alarming and terrifying,” said M. Christian Green, president of the League of Women Voters of Louisiana. “The League is proud to join this fight and stand up for Louisianans’ right to privacy and right to vote.”
“This country was founded on the principle that government has no business arbitrarily intruding in our private affairs,” said John Davisson, Director of Litigation for the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC). “Yet this administration is trampling on our privacy at the grandest scale, illegally hoarding our sensitive personal information and threatening our most cherished rights. The law is clear: no national data bank. Together we’ll put a stop to this in court.”
Class action lawsuit alleges data consolidation within USCIS is illegal — NextGov
Voting groups ask court for immediate halt to Trump admin’s SAVE database overhaul — CyberScoop
Trump Administration Sued Over Massive ‘Interagency Database’ of Americans’ Private Information — Democracy Docket
A lawsuit tries to block the Trump administration’s efforts to merge personal data — NPR
DHS Sued Over Pooling of Citizens’ Data to Promote Trump Agenda — Bloomberg Law