The Supreme Court paused a lower-court ban, allowing the Trump administration to use its modified SAVE database for voter-citizenship checks while the case proceeds. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented, warning the system could burden or disenfranchise lawful voters.
The unsigned order relied on federal statutes authorizing the Department of Homeland Security to request citizenship and immigration-status information from other agencies. The majority said those provisions likely override other disclosure restrictions and predicted it would likely reverse the lower court’s findings of violations of the Social Security Act, Privacy Act and Administrative Procedure Act.
Federal law bars bulk removals from voter rolls within 90 days of an election, the order noted, but allows individualized inquiries during that period. Jackson, joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, criticized the decision for coming without full briefing or oral argument and argued that its legal analysis discounted risks to lawful voters.
