A story says that President Donald Trump’s Justice Department just gave the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) permission to search an online system with highly sensitive immigration case data. This data includes names, addresses, and records of interactions between immigrants and law enforcement.
According to government documents obtained by The Washington Post, Elon Musk’s “major reform” effort was given access to the Executive Office for Immigration Review’s Courts and Appeals System, or ECAS, by top DOJ officials after a group of DOGE “advisors” asked for permission.
Staff at the DOJ have been told that DOGE will be going through the ECAS accounts with the help of a private equity company that has ties to Musk and some of its members. The Post says that at least six DOGE “advisors” have been given access.
A senior staff attorney at the National Immigration Law Centre named Lynn Damiano Pearson told the newspaper that DOGE is breaking people’s rights to privacy and other laws that are meant to protect both citizens and noncitizens.
The way it works is a lot like what we see with Social Security and the IRS and data that was shared with the promise of privacy, Pearson said. In the end, she said, giving this much access would have “very concerning impacts for immigrants, even those who have tried to follow government rules and do everything right.”
The Post spoke to a government official familiar with ECAS who confirmed that DOGE will be able to look up immigrants’ names, the names of their lawyers and families, their addresses, and any interactions they’ve had with police in the past, whether they’ve been arrested or not.
The official is said to have said, “It’s every record of every interaction immigrants have had with the U.S. government in any way.”
In March, DOGE and the DOJ joined forces to form the JUST-DOGE team, which is made up of employees from both groups. According to its description, the team’s job is to find “savings and cost-cutting measures.” The Post said it couldn’t say for sure if the giving of ECAS access to DOGE “advisors” last week was done with the JUST-DOGE team in mind. Law&Crime tried to get in touch with the DOJ on Tuesday but were unable to do so.
Since it started earlier this year, DOGE has tried to get information about people living in the U.S. in a number of different ways. One way is through the Social Security Administration (SSA).
Last Thursday, a federal judge in Maryland upheld an order that DOGE could not access non-anonymized personal SSA data. They also told DOGE to “disgorge and delete” any personally identifying data they had and get rid of any software or code that the Musk-led group may have installed or changed on SSA computers since they got access.
The government tried to get the restraining order overturned in the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, but failed.
