Judge Rules Trump-Era Voter Database Unlawful
WASHINGTON, D.C.-A US federal judge has struck down a Trump administration database containing Americans’ private information, ruling that it was unlawfully created and used by some states to mistakenly remove eligible citizens from voter rolls.
Judge Sparkle Sooknanan of the US District Court for the District of Columbia said the database violated privacy rights and threatened voting rights.
“The federal government has knowingly trampled on the privacy rights of American citizens in a manner that threatens the sacred right to vote. This Court cannot stand idly by while that happens,” Sooknanan wrote.
The judge said federal agencies, acting to comply with an executive order aimed at reshaping federal elections, had combined and repurposed the private information of millions of Americans, including citizenship data they knew could be unreliable.
“Since then, states have partnered with the federal government to access the database and are actively removing United States citizens from voter rolls based on inaccurate information,” Sooknanan wrote.
The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed in September by a coalition of voting-rights and privacy advocates led by the League of Women Voters. The lawsuit challenged changes to the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) system, which is maintained by the US Department of Homeland Security to verify citizenship and immigration status.
In March 2025, President Donald Trump signed Executive Order 14248, which sought to overhaul federal election procedures by requiring documentary proof of citizenship for voter registration in federal elections. The order also directed federal agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security and the Social Security Administration, to help state and local authorities verify the citizenship or immigration status of registered voters and new applicants.
In a statement issued on June 22, the League of Women Voters, a national voting-rights organization, welcomed the ruling and said the database consolidated sensitive personal information belonging to millions of Americans. (IANS)
