Judge further limits DOGE's access to Social Security data

The big picture: U.S. District Judge Ellen Hollander temporarily blocked Musk and DOGE from accessing American's personal data in the SSA system last month, but the ban was set to expire Thursday, per Reuters.

• Hollander issued a temporary injunction Thursday extending the ban.
• The Trump administration had failed to prove why DOGE needed "unprecedented, unfettered access to virtually SSA's entire data systems in order to accomplish" its goals, Hollander wrote.
• Meanwhile, the labor unions and advocacy group that had brought the lawsuit against DOGE had succeeded in showing "that their members will suffer irreparable harm in the absence of a preliminary injunction," she wrote.

What they're saying: While the government's aim to "address fraud, waste, mismanagement, and bloat is laudable," it's not the issue at hand, Hollander wrote in the injunction.

• "The issue is about how they want to do the work," she noted.

• "For some 90 years, SSA has been guided by the foundational principle of an expectation of privacy with respect to its records. This case exposes a wide fissure in the foundation," she added.

Zoom out: DOGE-led efforts to eradicate fraud have also spurred Democrats to action, with some urging the Social Security Administration's inspector general to open a probe into DOGE's actions, Axios' Andrew Solender reported Thursday.

Go deeper: In DOGE effort to combat fraud, Social Security's core mission at stake