Trump asks justices to open Social Security doors for DOGE

WASHINGTON (CN) — President Donald Trump put the Supreme Court in the middle of another tug-of-war between the executive and the judiciary on Friday, asking the justices to jettison a lower court ruling so the U.S. DOGE Service can access the Social Security Administration systems that hold sensitive data on millions of Americans.

“This emergency application presents a now-familiar theme: a district court has issued sweeping injunctive relief without legal authority to do so, in ways that inflict ongoing, irreparable harm on urgent federal priorities and stymie the Executive Branch’s functions,” U.S. Solicitor General John Sauer wrote.

The Supreme Court is considering other emergency appeals from Trump on an end to birthright citizenship, the firing of independent regulators,migrant deportations under wartime authority, protected status for asylum seekers and aban on transgender service members.

Now, he also wants the justices to weigh in on whether Elon Musk’s DOGE can access Social Security information.

“The government cannot eliminate waste and fraud if district courts bar the very agency personnel with expertise and the designated mission of curtailing such waste and fraud from performing their jobs,” Saur wrote.

A group of labor unions sued the administration, claiming that it would give DOGE nearly unlimited access to sensitive information. In a March hearing, U.S. District Judge Ellen Hollander repeatedly questioned attorneys for the government about why the DOGE team needed such a large quantity of sensitive personal information about Social Security recipients, including health records for disability applicants. She questioned whether a more targeted approach would allow DOGE to uncover improper payments without accessing so much data.

Trump castigated Hollander for assessing the needs of the executive branch. The White House said the lower court made glaring legal errors and usurped the administration’s authority.

DOGE officials want to modernize the federal government’s technology infrastructure and audit databases to identify waste, fraud and abuse. The Trump administration said it would be difficult to imagine how officials would complete this task without reviewing sensitive information.

“To assess the propriety of any payment, an analyst needs to know the details surrounding that payment, including information about the recipient of that payment, the amount of the payment, the payment’s purpose, and so forth,” Sauer wrote. “It is hard to fathom how such investigative work could be performed without access to the relevant payment records.”

Since retaking the Oval, Trump has flexed broad executive authority. Many of Trump’s policy objectives were unilaterally implemented. While this allowed Trump to avoid a lengthy legislative process, it also left his policies at the mercy of federal judges when advocacy groups sue.

Trump says the judiciary’s check on his authority is unconstitutional.

“The district court is installing itself as the supervisor of the SSA’s routine operational decisions such as whether to grant certain employees access to certain systems of records,” Sauer wrote. “Left undisturbed, this preliminary injunction will only invite further judicial incursions into internal agency decision-making.”

The justices requested a response from the labor unions on May 12.

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