Federal Judge Blocks DOGE From Social Security Data, Orders Deletion of Personal Records

U.S. District Judge Ellen Lipton Hollander in Maryland granted a preliminary injunction barring DOGE staffers from accessing non-anonymized personal data at the Social Security Administration, superseding a temporary restraining order issued on March 20. The judge wrote that DOGE’s approach to identifying fraud at the SSA was “tantamount to hitting a fly with a sledgehammer,” finding the administration never justified the need to access the data and likely violated multiple federal laws.

The order blocked the agency from granting DOGE access to systems containing personally identifiable information including Social Security numbers, medical records, mental health records, tax information, bank records, and family court records. DOGE and its affiliates were ordered to disgorge and delete all non-anonymized personally identifiable information in their possession since January 20, and were prohibited from installing any software on SSA systems. The ruling was part of a broader pattern of federal courts pushing back against DOGE’s sweeping data access demands, though the Supreme Court would later overturn this injunction in June 2025.