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, filed a class action lawsuit today challenging 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. 

The coalition is represented by Democracy Forward, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), and Fair Elections Center. 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:

  • 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.
  • Built a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) “Data Lake” that combines records from the IRS, SSA, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, U.S. Department of Labor, and state voter registration databases — containing Social Security numbers, tax information, medical records, biometric data, and children’s case files.

“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.” 

“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.”

“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.”

“News reports have repeatedly identified ways in which this administration is mishandling sensitive information and putting Americans’ data privacy at risk. And now, yet again, this administration is playing fast and loose with our personal information – building exactly the kind of ‘Big Brother’ databases Congress has repeatedly outlawed more than 50 years ago,” said Skye Perryman, President and CEO of Democracy Forward. “Pooling sensitive personal records from across the government not only violates the law, it threatens Americans’ privacy, voting rights, and civil liberties. We’re in court to stop it.”

“The government’s creation of massive, secret databases of Americans’ personal information, in violation of the law, poses serious privacy and data-security risks and threatens to disenfranchise eligible voters,” said Noah Bookbinder, President and CEO of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. “States are already reportedly using these databases to open criminal investigations and to purge state voter rolls based on citizenship information that the government itself has admitted is unreliable. This illegal overreach is unacceptable, and we are proud to represent these plaintiffs as they take action to stop it.”

“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 enacted safeguards on the use of such information 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 lawsuit asks the court to block the administration’s efforts to operate these systems and to order the deletion of unlawfully collected data.

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 filing here.

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