The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) is asking a federal court to stop the Trump administration from creating new lists of U.S. citizens for state election officials, just days before the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) says the lists must be ready.
EPIC sued DHS and other federal agencies in Maryland federal court this week, arguing that the government has no legal authority to combine Social Security, immigration and other federal records to create what President Donald Trump calls “State Citizenship Lists.”
The lists are supposed to identify U.S. citizens over 18 who live in each state. According to an internal DHS implementation plan cited in the lawsuit, they must be completed and transmitted to state election officials by September 4.
[NOTE: Trump ordered the lists created in March as part of an executive order on federal elections. The White House says the federal government has a duty to prevent noncitizens from voting, which it characterizes as a major problem, and that the lists will help states verify voter eligibility.]
EPIC says the government is combining personal information that federal law deliberately keeps in separate systems — information that potentially could include Social Security numbers, addresses and citizenship records.
“This is precisely the nightmare ‘Big Brother’ scenario that the Privacy Act exists to prevent,” EPIC enforcement director John Davisson said.
The lawsuit arrived less than two weeks after the Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration to move ahead with the election order while a separate challenge brought by Democratic-led states continues.
The Supreme Court did not decide whether the citizenship lists themselves are legal. Instead, the 6-3 majority ruled — along partisan lines — that the states had sued too soon. The Court said any harm depended on what DHS ultimately did to implement Trump’s directive.
“Emphasis on might,” the majority wrote in describing whether DHS would take action that injured the states.
[NOTE: That distinction could matter now. When an earlier lawsuit was before U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols in May, he similarly said it was too early to stop the citizenship lists because DHS had not yet established the infrastructure or determined what information would be used. Nichols wrote that the challengers could return “if and when those future actions occur.”]
DHS has since approved an implementation plan, and a government webpage announcing a “State Citizenship Lists Portal” appeared this week saying the system was “Coming Soon.”
Why did DHS create this website? More importantly, why since Democracy Docket published its story, is it now down? https://t.co/ftpnPnECpG
— Marc E. Elias (@marceelias) September 2, 2026
EPIC’s complaint also points to a June ruling involving an earlier federal citizenship-checking system. U.S. District Judge Sparkle Sooknanan ruled that changes allowing DHS to combine Social Security data with its SAVE immigration database violated federal privacy and Social Security laws. The government has appealed.
Trump’s March order acknowledges that the new citizenship lists must be created “consistent with applicable law,” which EPIC argues cannot be done under the administration’s current plan.
“No statute authorizes Defendants to share and centralize vast volumes of Americans’ sensitive personal data across government agencies,” the complaint says.