Supreme Court allows Trump administration to use voter citizenship database

The Supreme Court has cleared the Trump administration to resume using an expanded federal database to help states check voter rolls for people who may not be eligible to vote because they are not U.S. citizens.

In a 6-3 emergency ruling Friday, the justices paused a lower-court order that had blocked the administration from using the revamped Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or SAVE, system. The decision comes weeks before the November midterm elections and allows the government to continue using the system while the broader legal dispute moves forward.

The Washington Post reported that the database combines immigration records with information from the Social Security Administration, including Social Security numbers. The Trump administration has argued that the expanded system will give states another way to identify possible noncitizens on their voter rolls.

The system was significantly changed after Trump signed an executive order directing federal agencies to help states verify voters’ citizenship. The revamped version allows states to conduct bulk searches and includes records covering natural-born citizens as well as immigrants and naturalized citizens.

The database has faced substantial legal challenges. In June, U.S. District Judge Sparkle Sooknanan ruled that the administration’s overhaul violated federal law, including restrictions governing Social Security information and privacy protections. She also cited evidence that some citizens had been incorrectly identified as noncitizens.

An appeals court later declined to lift that restriction, setting the stage for the administration’s emergency request to the Supreme Court. The Justice Department argued that blocking the system interfered with the federal government’s ability to respond to states seeking citizenship verification.

Voting-rights and privacy groups have raised concerns about erroneous matches and the possibility that eligible voters could face additional scrutiny or removal from registration lists. Court filings have documented instances in which citizens were flagged incorrectly.

Friday’s ruling does not finally resolve those legal questions. Instead, it permits the expanded SAVE system to operate while the case continues through the courts, putting the federal database back into use ahead of a major national election.