After months of congressional disputes that saw the removal of an independent privacy oversight committee proposed by Irvin, President Gerald Ford signed the Privacy Act on December 31, 1974. His final months of office highlighted the important need to provide appropriate and uniform privacy protection measures for the vast amount of personal information collected, recorded and used. A complex society.”
How is this related today?
Doge critics include Democrats, federal employee unions and government watchdog groups – making sensitive government data accessible to young, controversial and seemingly unignored staff in their offices. constitutes a major invasion of privacy. Incidents represent “the largest and most consequential breach of personal information in US history,” according to John Davisson, an attorney for the Center for Electronic Privacy and Information, one of the groups suing to block Doge's access.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration says Doge employees need this data access to achieve their mission to eliminate wasted spending and closure programs that are opposed to President Donald Trump's agenda. A White House spokesman called the rule “absurd and judicial overreach” after a federal judge temporarily blocked access to Doge's government payment system. Musk targeted the judge with X and said, “He needs to be fired each now!”
Can privacy laws stop Doge?
It depends on whether multiple judges agree to the Trump administration's argument that argues that the law does not prevent DOGE staff from accessing agency sensitive data.
The government argues that only agents can sue under the privacy law in one of four scenarios. If the agent refuses someone to access the records. When the agent refuses to change someone's records as requested. If the agency fails to keep someone's records up to date and experiences specific harm, such as denial of profit. Or if the agency violates the requirements of the law in a way that negatively affects someone. It remains to be seen whether the judge will decide that access to Doge's data will negatively affect people.
The agency also argues that Doge's activities do not violate privacy laws as they fall under the “daily use” and “need to know” exceptions of the law. In a court filing in response to one legal issue, the Ministry of Finance states that Doge officials will access data and identify potentially inappropriate payments. [their] The obligations Trump has directed (stimulating an exception that “needs to know”) and sharing this information with other agencies constitute one of the “routine uses” that the agency has disclosed in response to requests under the privacy laws. was classified.
The strength of that argument depends on how the judge weighs two questions. Whether Doge personnel accessing data for each agency are employees of those agencies, and whether two exceptions apply to situations where data was accessed and shared.
Who is using privacy laws to sue Doge?
There have been at least eight lawsuits against the Trump administration, and there have been lawsuits over Doge's access to federal data, all of which rely on privacy laws, at least in part.
- The United States Federation of Government Employees, the Association of Administrative Law Judges, and more than 100 current and former federal workers are suing Doge, Musk, and the Office of Personnel Management. A federal employee database that DOGE staff argues that “there is no legal and legitimate need for such access.”
- On behalf of unnamed federal workers, the Electronic Privacy Information Center has said it would be “under the Privacy Act, as DOGE is said to have access to OPM, Doge and the Ministry of Finance's personal database and the Ministry of Finance's payment system.” “It's not acceptable.”
- The University of California Student Association is suing the Department of Education because the language of privacy law alleges that the student data is passed on to Doge staff who are not “employees who need a record of their job performance.”
- Six government unions, two nonprofit organizations, and the think tank Economic Policy Institute, will help prevent Doge from accessing a wide range of data, including the Department of Labor and Health and Human Services, the Department of Consumer Financial Protection, and Doge from accessing a wide range of data, including the federal government. I'm suing. Workers' wage theft complaints and reports of injuries have been reported with the purpose of being “contradictory to the Privacy Act.”
- The two government unions and the alliance of advocacy groups for retired Americans allegedly gave Doge access to American tax returns on suspicion of violating both the Privacy Act and the Internal Revenue Service's special rules He is suing the Ministry of Finance.
- The National Treasury Employees Union is suing CFPB Director Russell Vought for providing information about CFPB employees to Doge staff.
- The 19 state attorney generals are suing Trump and the Treasury department over access to Doge's federal payment system. [the system] He was not an employee of the Ministry of Finance, which constituted a “violation of the Privacy Act.”
- Six Americans are suing the Treasury Department, and they are breaching sensitive personal data they gave to the government while they filed their tax returns and filed student loan applications, requesting disability payments, and receiving retirement benefits. Doge what explains.
Where are these cases?
In the case of the state AGS, the judge immediately issued a temporary restraining order restricting access to all financial systems that store sensitive personal and financial data. The case was then permanently assigned to another judge who adjusted the order slightly after the Trump administration opposed restrictions on political appointees. A status hearing took place on February 14th.
In the grand case, the organization sought a judge for a temporary restraining order that blocked further Doge access to certain financial and OPM systems. A status hearing will be held on February 21st.
