WASHINGTON — Federal workers unions scored a significant victory Monday as a judge in Maryland barred the Department of Education and the Office of Personnel Management from sharing sensitive information about their members with billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
U.S. District Judge Deborah L. Boardman, a Biden appointee, said DOGE’s access to federal student loan systems and employee files likely violated the Privacy Act, a federal law which requires government agencies to guard against unauthorized access to personally identifiable information stored on their systems. Between the two agencies alone, Boardman said, DOGE employees could get access to Social Security and bank account numbers, dates of birth, physical and email addresses, performance appraisals and information about family members that would allow them to create a “comprehensive picture” of a person’s private and professional life.
“There appears to be no precedent with similar facts,” Boardman wrote “In other Privacy Act cases where the need-to-know exception is invoked, the dispute typically involves the alleged unauthorized disclosure of one record. This case involves the alleged unauthorized disclosure of millions of records. Even under existing precedent, this appears to be unlawful.”
On Monday, Boardman granted a temporary restraining order (TRO) barring the Department of Education and Office of Personnel Management from disclosing personally identifiable information with DOGE employees about a group of individual plaintiffs and members of four federal workers unions. Boardman ordered the TRO to remain in effect until at least March 10.
The challenge to DOGE’s access to federal systems, one of numerous lawsuits now filed around the country, was brought earlier this month by the American Federation of Teachers, International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association and the National Federation of Federal Employees. Between them the unions represent more than 1.7 million teachers and more than 800,000 other active or retired workers. Following the creation of DOGE by executive order in January, the group’s sued to force DOE, OPM and the Department of Treasury to comply with the requirements of the Privacy Act.
“Today, Defendants are permitting Elon Musk and a cadre of loyalists imported from his private companies to help themselves to the personal information of millions of Americans, in violation of those legal requirements,” the complaint said.
Boardman denied their motion with respect to Treasury because another federal judge in New York on granted a preliminary injunction on Friday sought by 19 states that bars DOGE employees from accessing Treasury systems containing personally identifiable information or confidential financial information.
Federal courts have been flooded over the past month with lawsuits challenging Musk’s influential but opaque role as one of President Donald Trump’s top White House advisors. In court filings, attorneys for the Justice Department have argued Musk holds a purely advisory position and that he is not the administration of DOGE, which was created by executive order out of the former U.S Digital Service. Trump himself has repeatedly appeared to contradict that, however, including a statement as recently as last week that he’d placed “a man named Elon Musk” in charge of DOGE.
In addition to challenges to Musk and DOGE’s presence at DOE, OPM and Treasury, last week the Center for Taxpayer Rights filed a lawsuit in federal court in D.C. seeking to bar them from gaining access to sensitive data held by the IRS. That case was assigned to U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, a Clinton appointee who is also considering a challenge by a coalition of American retirees to DOGE’s access to their personal data held by the Treasury Department.