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For Immediate Release
January, 21 2026, 12:55pm EDT
Contact:
Linda Benesch, lbenesch@socialsecurityworks.org
DOGE Stole Private Social Security Data. Congress Must Investigate Now.
The following is a statement from Alex Lawson, Executive Director of Social Security Works:
“Nearly a year ago, Elon Musk’s DOGE forced out Social Security’s acting commissioner after she refused to hand over the American people’s private Social Security data.
Unions and advocates quickly filed a lawsuit to bar DOGE from accessing the data, but the Supreme Court issued a preliminary injunction restoring DOGE’s access. Now, we are beginning to learn what DOGE is doing with it.
New court filings related to the lawsuit reveal that DOGE operatives entered an agreement with an advocacy group to share private Social Security data — with the goal of overturning election results in several states. The filings do not reveal the identity of either the DOGE operatives or the advocacy group.
Thanks to Donald Trump and the Supreme Court, Elon Musk’s DOGE minions have access to our private Social Security data. So does anyone they choose to share it with — and anyone who can hack the unsecured server they’ve stored it on.
This week’s revelations are just the tip of the iceberg. We need to know exactly who has our data and what they are doing with it. And those who have committed illegal acts must be prosecuted.
Republicans in Congress love to claim that they support Social Security. Now is their chance to prove it, by launching a long-overdue investigation into just what DOGE is doing with our earned benefits and our private data.”
Social Security Works' mission is to: Protect and improve the economic security of disadvantaged and at-risk populations; Safeguard the economic security of those dependent, now or in the future, on Social Security; and Maintain Social Security as a vehicle of social justice.
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