Search Articles
WASHINGTON (CN) — A federal judge on Monday slammed the Trump administration’s attempt at creating a searchable national citizenship database as a clear threat to voting rights.
U.S. District Judge Sparkle Sooknanan sided with the League of Women Voters to block the database which would have consisted of made up of individuals’ Social Security numbers, citizenship status and other sensitive data.
The judge found the government’s use of the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements system to create the database violated key provisions of the Social Security Act and the Privacy Act of 1974 prohibiting the non-consensual disclosure of sensitive information.
In a 75-page opinion, Sooknanan ruled the modification of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service’s SAVE tool was clearly unlawful.
The Joe Biden appointee noted Congress enacted both statutes to prevent “precisely this type of centralized data bank.”
And despite knowing the database violated those statutes, the Department of Homeland Security, the Social Security Administration and the Department of Justice moved forward with its creation anyway, Sooknanan said.
President Donald Trump instructed the Department of Homeland Security to begin work on the database in a March 25, 2025 executive order titled, “Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections.”
In response, the agencies “scrambl[ed]” to comply and “haphazardly combined and repurposed” the information of millions of Americans including unreliable citizenship data.
“All in all, the federal government has knowingly trampled on the privacy rights of American citizens in a manner that threatens the sacred right to vote,” Sooknanan wrote. “This court cannot stand idly by while that happens.”
The League of Women Voters — joined by chapters in Virginia and Louisiana as well as the Electronic Privacy Information Center — filed their lawsuit in September 2025, and compared the database to the dossiers kept on citizens by the fictional Oceania in George Orwell’s dystopia “1984.”
The USCIS tool was created in 1986 to allow federal, state, local or tribal governments to search an individual’s immigration and nationality status to determine their eligibility for a public benefit, a license or grant, a government credential, or to assist in a background check.
Under the executive order, the tool was modified in three major ways: to include the records of natural-born citizens; to access Social Security records, including Social Security numbers; and to permit bulk searches of records by SAVE users.
In addition to the SAVE tool, the Trump administration created another “Interagency Data System” that consolidates other governmental data sources that may have information concerning immigrants into a centralized “data lake” at USCIS, which includes millions of Americans’ Social Security numbers, biometric data, tax information, employment and medical records, among others.
The League of Women Voters included testimony in its suit from five pseudonymous plaintiffs who have been incorporated into the databases — including J. Doe 1, a university professor in Texas and a naturalized citizen, who has had their Social Security information incorporated into the SAVE system despite inaccurately stating they are not a U.S. citizen.
Sooknanan noted the reliance on inaccurate citizenship information to label individuals as non-citizens amounts to defamation, slamming the government’s argument that any such label does not inflict such harm as “border[ing] on the absurd.”
“The defendants’ view on the importance of citizenship bears little resemblance to reality,” Sooknanan said. “As evidenced by the actions taken by state authorities in this case, even the mere suggestion of non-citizenship can have grievous consequences. This remains as true for a naturalized citizen as any other.”
The League of Women Voters celebrated Monday’s decision in a statement.
“Today’s decision is a resounding victory for voters,” Marcia Johnson, chief of activation and justice for the League. “Efforts to create a federal voter database to facilitate voter purges threaten the fundamental right at the heart of our democracy. The League of Women Voters will continue advocating for an electoral system where evener eligible voter can participate with confidence and where elections remain fair, accurate and accessible.”
The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Follow @Ryan_KnappySubscribe to our free newsletters
Our weekly newsletter Closing Arguments offers the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world, while the monthly Under the Lights dishes the legal dirt from Hollywood, sports, Big Tech and the arts.
