Nineteen Democratic attorneys general sued President Donald Trump on Friday to stop Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency from accessing Treasury Department records that contain sensitive personal data such as Social Security and bank account numbers for millions of Americans.
The case, filed in federal court in New York City, alleges the Trump administration allowed Musk’s team access to the Treasury Department’s central payment system in violation of federal law.
The payment system handles tax refunds, Social Security benefits, veterans’ benefits and much more, sending out trillions of dollars every year while containing an expansive network of Americans’ personal and financial data.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, also known as DOGE, was created to discover and eliminate what the Trump administration has deemed to be wasteful government spending. DOGE’s access to Treasury records, as well as its inspection of various government agencies, has ignited widespread concern among critics over the increasing power of Musk, while supporters have cheered at the idea of reining in bloated government finances.
New York Attorney General Letitia James, whose office filed the lawsuit, said DOGE’s access to the Treasury Department’s data raises security problems and the possibility for an illegal freeze in federal funds.
“This unelected group, led by the world’s richest man, is not authorized to have this information, and they explicitly sought this unauthorized access to illegally block payments that millions of Americans rely on, payments for health care, child care and other essential programs,” James said in a video message released by her office.
James, a Democrat who has been one of Trump’s chief antagonists, said the president does not have the power to give away American’s private information to anyone he chooses, and he cannot cut federal payments approved by Congress.
Also on the lawsuit are Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin.
The suit alleges that DOGE’s access to the Treasury records could interfere with funding already appropriated by Congress, which would exceed the Treasury Department’s statutory authority. The case also argues that the DOGE access violates federal administrative law and the US Constitution’s separation of powers doctrine.
It also accuses Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent of changing the department’s longstanding policy for protecting sensitive personally identifiable information and financial information to allow Musk’s DOGE team access to its payment systems.
“This decision failed to account for legal obligations to protect such data and ignored the privacy expectations of federal fund recipients,” including states, veterans, retirees, and taxpayers, the lawsuit says.
The Treasury Department has said the review is about assessing the integrity of the system and that no changes are being made. According to two people familiar with the process, Musk’s team began its inquiry looking for ways to suspend payments made by the US Agency for International Development, which Trump and Musk are attempting to dismantle. The two people spoke with The Associated Press on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation.
Separately, Democratic lawmakers are seeking a Treasury Department investigation of DOGE’s access to the government’s payment system.
Also, labor unions and advocacy groups have sued to block the payments system review over concerns about its legality. A judge in Washington on Thursday temporarily restricted access to two employees with “read only” privileges.
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19 states sue to stop DOGE from accessing Americans’ personal data
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19 states sue to stop DOGE from accessing Americans’ personal data
Olympic organizers invoke an ancient pledge to call for the suspension of all wars
- In ancient Greece, a truce was respected by warring city-states, allowing athletes and spectators to travel safely to Ancient Olympia for competitions and ceremonies
ATHENS: If the rules of ancient Greece were observed today, drone and missile fire over Ukraine would stop on Friday as guns fall silent in the Olympic tradition.
The Milan Cortina Winter Olympics begin in one week, and the United Nations and organizers are calling for a 7-week pause of all wars worldwide — as they do every time the Olympics take place.
It serves to set a moral baseline at a time when some researchers say there are more armed conflicts than ever before and Earth is at its closest to destruction.
An ancient pause, a modern plea
In ancient Greece, a truce was respected by warring city-states, allowing athletes and spectators to travel safely to Ancient Olympia for competitions and ceremonies of supreme athletic and spiritual significance.
The Olympics were revived in their modern form in 1896. The truce’s resurgence followed nearly a century later, in 1994, as war raged through the former Yugoslavia.
The proposed timeout starts one week before the Winter Games open on Feb. 6 and runs until one week after the March 15 Paralympics’ close. It is backed by a UN General Assembly resolution.
If history is any indication, no sudden worldwide peace is imminent: The truce has a dismal 0-17 record, having failed to halt a single war.
Sarajevo, Korea and the power of sport
The first modern Olympic truce, during the 1994 Winter Games in Lillehammer, Norway, did produce a one-day pause in the siege of Sarajevo, allowing aid convoys to deliver food and medicine to the Bosnian capital’s desperate residents. In Sydney six years later, North and South Korea marched together at the opening ceremony.
Governments around the world overwhelmingly agree that sport can unite and heal.
“Wherever possible, we should strive toward creating even a small space for peace,” Constantinos Filis, director of the International Olympic Truce Center, told The Associated Press.
Ceasefire initiatives still count in an era of global disorder and political polarization, as unilateral aggression increasingly threatens international cooperation, argues Filis, who is also director of the Institute of Global Affairs in Athens.
“This may not always be achievable in practice,” he said, “but the message reaches every corner of the globe.”
Arithmetic of a world’s wars
Outside the Swedish capital of Stockholm, a group of academics has tracked global war trends for more than 80 years. It reported that 2024 had the highest number of active armed conflicts in a single year: 61.
“We’ve seen quite a strong increase in the number of conflicts over the past five or six years,” said Shawn Davies, a senior analyst at Uppsala University’s Department of Peace and Conflict Research. And its upcoming annual report will show 2025 had even more conflicts than the prior year, he added.
As the US steps back from multilateralism, Davies said, countries are becoming more likely to test their neighbors, creating a more volatile, fragmented security landscape.
Some major conflicts remain largely unnoticed in the West, he said, pointing to western Africa, where Al-Qaeda and Daesh group affiliates continue to spread across borders.
And the “Doomsday Clock”, a symbolic gauge of Earth’s existential peril, edged closer to midnight this week, according to an announcement from members of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
Hope versus broken promises
UN truce resolutions typically pass with broad majorities. Yet signatories repeatedly break their own pledge. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 infamously began during a truce period.
“I think the Olympics are an excellent moment to symbolize peace, to symbolize respect for international law, and to symbolize international cooperation,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres told reporters Thursday.
Kirsty Coventry, the multi-Olympic swimming champion who last year became the first woman to lead the International Olympic Committee, addressed the General Assembly at the latest vote in November.
Watching peaceful competition, she said, inspired her to begin her gold-medal journey as a young girl in Zimbabwe.
“Even in these dark times of division, it is possible to celebrate our shared humanity and inspire hope for a better future,” Coventry said.
“Sport — and the Olympic Games in particular — can offer a rare space where people meet not as adversaries, but as fellow human beings,” she said. “This is why the Olympic Truce is so important.”
The Milan Cortina Winter Olympics begin in one week, and the United Nations and organizers are calling for a 7-week pause of all wars worldwide — as they do every time the Olympics take place.
It serves to set a moral baseline at a time when some researchers say there are more armed conflicts than ever before and Earth is at its closest to destruction.
An ancient pause, a modern plea
In ancient Greece, a truce was respected by warring city-states, allowing athletes and spectators to travel safely to Ancient Olympia for competitions and ceremonies of supreme athletic and spiritual significance.
The Olympics were revived in their modern form in 1896. The truce’s resurgence followed nearly a century later, in 1994, as war raged through the former Yugoslavia.
The proposed timeout starts one week before the Winter Games open on Feb. 6 and runs until one week after the March 15 Paralympics’ close. It is backed by a UN General Assembly resolution.
If history is any indication, no sudden worldwide peace is imminent: The truce has a dismal 0-17 record, having failed to halt a single war.
Sarajevo, Korea and the power of sport
The first modern Olympic truce, during the 1994 Winter Games in Lillehammer, Norway, did produce a one-day pause in the siege of Sarajevo, allowing aid convoys to deliver food and medicine to the Bosnian capital’s desperate residents. In Sydney six years later, North and South Korea marched together at the opening ceremony.
Governments around the world overwhelmingly agree that sport can unite and heal.
“Wherever possible, we should strive toward creating even a small space for peace,” Constantinos Filis, director of the International Olympic Truce Center, told The Associated Press.
Ceasefire initiatives still count in an era of global disorder and political polarization, as unilateral aggression increasingly threatens international cooperation, argues Filis, who is also director of the Institute of Global Affairs in Athens.
“This may not always be achievable in practice,” he said, “but the message reaches every corner of the globe.”
Arithmetic of a world’s wars
Outside the Swedish capital of Stockholm, a group of academics has tracked global war trends for more than 80 years. It reported that 2024 had the highest number of active armed conflicts in a single year: 61.
“We’ve seen quite a strong increase in the number of conflicts over the past five or six years,” said Shawn Davies, a senior analyst at Uppsala University’s Department of Peace and Conflict Research. And its upcoming annual report will show 2025 had even more conflicts than the prior year, he added.
As the US steps back from multilateralism, Davies said, countries are becoming more likely to test their neighbors, creating a more volatile, fragmented security landscape.
Some major conflicts remain largely unnoticed in the West, he said, pointing to western Africa, where Al-Qaeda and Daesh group affiliates continue to spread across borders.
And the “Doomsday Clock”, a symbolic gauge of Earth’s existential peril, edged closer to midnight this week, according to an announcement from members of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
Hope versus broken promises
UN truce resolutions typically pass with broad majorities. Yet signatories repeatedly break their own pledge. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 infamously began during a truce period.
“I think the Olympics are an excellent moment to symbolize peace, to symbolize respect for international law, and to symbolize international cooperation,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres told reporters Thursday.
Kirsty Coventry, the multi-Olympic swimming champion who last year became the first woman to lead the International Olympic Committee, addressed the General Assembly at the latest vote in November.
Watching peaceful competition, she said, inspired her to begin her gold-medal journey as a young girl in Zimbabwe.
“Even in these dark times of division, it is possible to celebrate our shared humanity and inspire hope for a better future,” Coventry said.
“Sport — and the Olympic Games in particular — can offer a rare space where people meet not as adversaries, but as fellow human beings,” she said. “This is why the Olympic Truce is so important.”
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