Trump Asks Supreme Court to Restore SAVE Citizenship Checks Before Midterms

Solicitor General D. John Sauer asked the Supreme Court on Tuesday to lift a June order that blocks the expanded Department of Homeland Security SAVE system states use to match voter rolls against federal citizenship, immigration, and Social Security records. Sauer called U.S. District Judge Sparkle Sooknanan’s ruling “an indefensible order that threatens the integrity of upcoming elections” by stripping the government’s authority to use Social Security data when answering state requests to verify citizenship for voting and other purposes. Without a stay, he wrote, DHS must rely on an “older, more cumbersome, and less reliable” version of SAVE, and any later reversal “would come too late for the 2026 midterms.” Chief Justice John Roberts, who handles emergency matters from the D.C. Circuit, directed the challengers to respond by 4 p.m. Sept. 15. The filing is the administration’s second election-related emergency application in three days, after a separate request on the Postal Service mail-ballot rule.

SAVE, created by Congress in 1986, originally let states check immigration status for public-benefit applicants. Last year the administration added Social Security Administration records and bulk-upload searches so election officials could run large voter lists rather than one-at-a-time queries. The government says more than 67 million registrations were checked before the June order, mostly in Republican-led states. Sooknanan, a Biden appointee, granted summary judgment on June 22 to the League of Women Voters and other plaintiffs. She held DHS lacked statutory authority for the modified system and that it violated the Social Security Act, the Privacy Act, and the Administrative Procedure Act. She wrote the government had “trampled on the privacy rights of American citizens in a manner that threatens the sacred right to vote.” Democracy Forward, which represents the challengers, said “millions of Americans’ sensitive personal information and the integrity of our elections are on the line.” On Sept. 4 a D.C. Circuit panel left the block in place 2–1. Chief Judge Sri Srinivasan and Judge Robert Wilkins, both Obama appointees, said the government had not met the standard for a stay pending appeal. Judge Gregory Katsas, a Trump appointee, dissented. The panel ordered the merits appeal expedited.

The administration’s position is that SAVE answers requests from states; it does not by itself cancel registrations. Sauer acknowledged the National Voter Registration Act’s 90-day pre-election window but said officials can still make individualized decisions about noncitizens found on the rolls. The district court and the circuit majority pointed to naturalized citizens whose Social Security files still listed them as noncitizens and to the risk of wrongful challenges. Texas appeared in the lower-court litigation seeking to keep using the tool. A separate Florida order earlier this summer directed DHS to restore access for four Republican-led states, creating overlapping commands the government has cited as a reason for high-court review. The justices have not set a date for a decision. Midterm ballots are already in the mail in some states. The expanded SAVE functions remain offline unless the Court stays Sooknanan’s judgment.