The Court paused a lower-court injunction that had blocked federal use of a SAVE database altered to include U.S.-born citizens and Social Security numbers, leaving the dispute to continue in the courts 39 days before the 2026 midterm elections.
Amy Howe, Supreme Court clears way for Trump administration to use modified voter verification database, SCOTUSblog (Sep.
Those agencies then modified the Department of Homeland Security's Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements database, known as the SAVE system, to include the records of U.S.-born citizens, to give it...
In late March, President Trump signed an executive order directing DHS and the Social Security Administration to build systems allowing state and local officials to verify citizenship and immigration status. DHS and SSA then altered the SAVE system to add records of U.S.-born citizens, link Social Security numbers, and permit multiple simultaneous searches.
Legal challenge and lower-court ruling
Appeals and emergency relief to the Supreme Court
The government appealed. A divided D.C. Circuit panel declined to stay the district-court injunction but expedited the appeal and left briefing pending the Supreme Court's action. The Solicitor General, D. John Sauer, asked the Supreme Court on Sept. 8 to freeze the district court's order while litigation proceeds, arguing the injunction threatens election administration and that the challengers lack standing.
Supreme Court decision and dissents
The Court's unsigned majority granted the government an interim stay, stating the lower-court order "inhibits the Federal Government's efforts to assist state and local agencies in the proper administration of the midterm elections." The decision pauses enforcement of Judge Sooknanan's ruling while the appeal continues.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented, joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. Jackson called the majority's stay a "questionable interim ruling[] about two statutory provisions" the Court has not previously interpreted. She said the majority focused on harms to the government if the injunction remained in place, and disregarded harms the modified database has caused and may continue to cause to lawful voters.
The government told the Court the injunction undoes its authority to use Social Security data internally to respond to state verification requests and would undermine election integrity. The challengers argued the government created an error-prone master citizenship database that endangers privacy and voting rights, and that states will predictably act on incorrect information, harming voters.
The stay is temporary while the litigation proceeds through the D.C. Circuit and potentially back to the Supreme Court for full review. The substantive questions include whether the database changes violate the Social Security Act, federal privacy protections, and administrative-law requirements, and whether the challengers have standing to sue.
States and local officials who sought to use the modified SAVE system regain access while the stay is in place. Plaintiffs and affected voters remain able to seek relief on the merits during the pending appeals, but the injunction that had blocked federal use is not in effect for now.
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