District Judge, Deborah Boardman in Greenbelt, Maryland issued the temporary restraining order at the directive of a coalition of Labour Unions who argued that the agencies wrongly granted Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, DOGE, access to records containing personal information on millions of Americans.
The judge said the plaintiffs had established that both agencies had likely violated federal law by granting DOGE sweeping access to sensitive personal information in violation of the Privacy Act of 1974.
According to the Judge, that information, included Social Security numbers, dates of birth, home addresses, income and assets, citizenship status and disability status for current and former federal employees and student aid recipients.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration had argued that a ruling blocking DOGE from accessing the information would impede the Republican president’s ability to fulfill his agenda by limiting what information his advisors can access.
However, an appointee of Trump’s Democratic predecessor Joe Biden, Boardman, said her order prevents the disclosure of the plaintiffs’ sensitive personal information to DOGE affiliates who, on the current record, do not have a need to know the information to perform their duties.
The White House is yet to comment on the development.