Washington, DC - With elections rapidly approaching in locations around the nation, the League of Women Voters, along with three individual plaintiffs, asked a court for emergency relief in a class action lawsuit that seeks to stop the Trump-Vance administration’s unlawful creation of massive government databases consolidating sensitive and legally protected personal information on millions of people in America to unlawfully open investigations and purge voter rolls. Today’s emergency filing follows last week’s class action lawsuit, filed on behalf of the League of Women Voters, League of Women Voters of Virginia, League of Women Voters of Louisiana, and Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), along with five individual plaintiffs. The coalition is represented by Democracy Forward Foundation, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), and Fair Elections Center.
The request for a preliminary injunction, 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 transformed the DHS’s Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) system into a national citizenship database pooling SSA data known to be unreliable, now being used by some states to purge voter rolls and open criminal investigations. The filing seeks to prevent voters from being unlawfully purged and targeted by this broken and illegal system.
“With early voting already underway, there is no time to lose,” said Joan Porte, President of the League of Women Voters of Virginia. “Virginians deserve fair and secure elections, not politically motivated purges based on faulty data. The League is fighting to ensure every eligible voter can cast a ballot and have it counted. That's what our democracy demands.”
"Private information should never be used to silence or intimidate voters,” said M. Christian Green, President of the League of Women Voters of Louisiana. “This administration’s unlawful data collection threatens the very foundation of our democracy. We’re taking action to ensure every eligible voter in Louisiana — and across the country — can safely participate in our elections.”
“This administration’s attempt to manipulate federal data systems to unlawfully target its own citizens and purge voters is one of the most serious threats to free and fair elections in decades,” said Celina Stewart, CEO of the League of Women Voters of the United States. “The League is asking the court to act swiftly to stop this abuse of power before it disenfranchises lawful voters. Every citizen deserves privacy, fairness, and the freedom to vote without fear of government interference.”
“The administration’s illegal pooling of sensitive data and efforts to purge voter rolls undermine the integrity of free and fair elections. These actions, especially right before the fall elections, point to a deliberate effort at disenfranchisement and show disdain for the privacy of voters,” said John Davisson, Director of Litigation for the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC). “We won’t allow this administration to continue flouting the law and putting voters at risk.”
“The effort to block this administration’s election meddling has become even more urgent as early voting has already started, with more elections on the horizon. Any efforts to tamper with results by denying eligible people their right to vote are a serious threat to our democracy,” said Skye Perryman, President and CEO of Democracy Forward. “The data at the heart of our lawsuit was unlawfully consolidated in violation of privacy laws intended to protect sensitive personal information. We are honored to work alongside the plaintiffs and co-counsel in this case, and urge the court to grant the emergency relief needed to protect our elections.”
“The court must act immediately to prevent eligible American voters from being disenfranchised in this fall’s election,” said Noah Bookbinder, President and CEO of CREW. “The government’s unlawful creation of these secret databases should not be allowed to continue, and we are proud to represent these plaintiffs as they seek to prevent voters from being unlawfully purged from the voter rolls.”
“The administration’s unlawful consolidation of sensitive data poses an unprecedented threat to naturalized voters’ right to participate in our democracy,” said Jon Sherman, Litigation Director of Fair Elections Center. “Relying on outdated and incomplete data to assess voters’ citizenship status in the present day is completely illogical. This is precisely why Congress has forbidden using such information in new ways without public notice and input.”
The administration’s unlawful data consolidation threatens to disenfranchise eligible voters and subject Americans to unwarranted investigations, and creates unprecedented security risks by placing sensitive, personal information in a single target-rich system. The request asks the court to block the administration’s efforts to operate these systems and to order the deletion of unlawfully collected data, and the preliminary injunction request filed today asks the court to stop the administration from moving forward with its data consolidation plans while the case is considered.
The case is League of Women Voters v. U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and the team at Democracy Forward in this case includes Aman George, Mark Samburg, Hanna Hickman, Sophie Gelber, and Robin Thurston.
Read the request for a preliminary injunction here, and the original complaint here.