DHS Data-Sharing Initiative Raises Privacy Concerns and Voter Disenfranchisement Fears
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The Department of Homeland Security’s expanded use of a voter roll verification system, intended to bolster claims of widespread noncitizen voting, is instead sparking alarm among privacy advocates and election experts who fear potential errors and the erosion of voter rights.
The initiative, building on the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) system, recently incorporated confidential data from the Social Security Administration (SSA) – a move that allows for bulk searches using Social Security numbers for the first time. While proponents framed the expansion as a means to expose illicit voting and strengthen immigration enforcement, initial results suggest noncitizen voting remains exceedingly rare. Texas, for example, identified just 2,724 “potential noncitizens” out of 18 million registered voters (approximately 0.015%), while Louisiana found 390 among 2.8 million (roughly 0.014%).
However, the sweeping data-sharing agreement between DHS and the SSA has ignited concerns about the potential for privacy breaches and the disenfranchisement of legitimate voters. Details of the agreement, previously unreported, reveal a lack of robust safeguards to ensure accuracy and limited clarity regarding data security. Critically, the agreement does not preclude DHS from utilizing the SSA data for purposes beyond voter verification, including immigration enforcement.
From Targeted Checks to Mass Data Mining
Until this year, SAVE primarily contained information on immigrants who had interacted with DHS, such as permanent residents assigned immigrant identification numbers. State and local officials used the system to verify status for benefit applications or during individual voter registration checks. The May 15 data-sharing agreement dramatically altered this scope, adding information – including full Social Security numbers – on millions of Americans not previously in DHS databases. This combined dataset now includes addresses, birth dates, criminal records, and immigration histories.
The agreement permits the use of SSA data to verify voter citizenship, as well as for “other authorized inquiries” from federal, state, and local agencies seeking to ascertain immigration status. According to the agreement and documents from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), SAVE stores both the voter data uploaded by election officials and the outcomes of these queries, though access protocols and data usage remain unclear.
Accuracy of Citizenship Data Questioned
Experts caution that while the expanded SAVE system could assist in verifying citizenship en masse, it should not be the sole basis for determining someone’s eligibility to vote. Multiple audits and analyses have demonstrated that the SSA’s citizenship information is often outdated or incomplete, particularly for naturalized citizens. With the 2026 midterm elections approaching, Caren Short, director of legal and research for the League of Women Voters of the United States, expressed fears that the expanded SAVE system will inevitably lead to errors.
“The Trump administration is hunting people to try to purge people from the rolls who are lawfully registered, and they are doing it by looking at unreliable, outdated data,” Short stated.
Several privacy lawyers argue that expanding SAVE without adhering to federal requirements – such as issuing a system of records notice detailing data collection, storage, and usage – is unlawful. Last month, advocacy groups filed a lawsuit against the federal government, alleging that the SAVE expansion and related data consolidation efforts violate the Privacy Act. USCIS officials declined to respond to inquiries from ProPublica.
In a court filing responding to the lawsuit, federal officials asserted that the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 authorizes information sharing for citizenship verification and that agencies will exercise caution in identifying noncitizens. The filing further stated, “There is zero basis to assume that State officials have any interest in haphazardly and unlawfully removing large numbers of U.S. citizens from their voter rolls, and no credible evidence that any such thing has happened or is going to happen any time soon.”
Concerns from Within the SSA
Despite the government’s assurances, skepticism remains. Leland Dudek, the former acting SSA commissioner, voiced concerns about DHS’s ability to accurately identify noncitizens when cross-matching data from multiple systems. “They are probably going to make some massive mistakes,” he warned.
The Justice Department’s recent demands for access to state voter registration lists, coupled with lawsuits against states refusing to comply, further complicate the situation. Some states, rather than directly providing data to the Justice Department, have opted to upload it into the SAVE system through agreements with DHS.
According to a document obtained by the ACLU, the number of states utilizing SAVE for voter roll vetting has doubled in the past year, from ten to twenty. Naomi Gilens, counsel for Protect Democracy, emphasized the importance of public consideration regarding the government’s consolidation of vast amounts of personal information. “That is a very invasive picture that starts to be painted, in one place, for every individual who lives here’s private lives,” she said.
Initial Results and Future Expansion
As of last month, Homeland Security officials had processed over 33 million voters through SAVE, according to USCIS. While the agency has not publicly released the results, a document obtained by the ACLU reveals that approximately 96.3% of voters checked were identified as U.S. citizens. An additional 3.1% required further investigation, 0.5% were found to be deceased, and only 0.04% were flagged as noncitizens.
State agreements with DHS mandate additional verification steps for voters identified as potentially non-citizens, requiring election officials to contact individuals for proof of citizenship if SAVE cannot definitively confirm their status. However, Dudek and Kathleen Romig, a former Social Security official now at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, worry that even these measures may not prevent inaccuracies.
Mismatches can occur due to misspelled names or variations in how names are listed across datasets. The use of partial Social Security numbers by many states further exacerbates the problem, as numerous individuals share the same names. “If there’s Jane Smith that is a citizen, and a Jane Smith that isn’t, you don’t want to disenfranchise the citizen Jane Smith by accident,” Romig explained.
Federal officials are already planning to expand SAVE further, with the next phase involving the integration of passport information from the State Department. .
The expansion of SAVE, initially presented as a tool to combat voter fraud, now stands as a stark example of the potential for well-intentioned initiatives to compromise privacy and undermine the fundamental right to vote.
