- The Supreme Court temporarily restored the expanded SAVE citizenship-verification program, allowing state and local election officials to use the system to check voter records against federal immigration, citizenship, and Social Security data.
- President Donald Trump secured a major victory for his election-integrity agenda as the Supreme Court allowed his administration to resume using the modified SAVE program, which was expanded in 2025 to incorporate Social Security records and allow bulk searches of voter records.
- The Supreme Court’s 6-3 order temporarily restores the modified SAVE program while litigation continues, with the majority concluding that the challengers’ claims against the program likely would fail and that federal immigration law authorizes the Department of Homeland Security to obtain citizenship information from other agencies.
President Donald Trump secured a major victory for his election-integrity agenda Friday when the Supreme Court allowed his administration to resume using an expanded federal system to check voter citizenship, weeks before the November 3 midterm elections.
The 6-3 order temporarily restores the modified SAVE program while the appeal proceeds. State and local election officials can again use the expanded system to check voter records against federal immigration, citizenship and Social Security data.
SAVE, short for Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, is a federal service that checks government records to help agencies verify citizenship and immigration status.
It began in 1986 for public-benefit eligibility checks, and states later used it for voter verification. Trump’s administration expanded it in 2025 to incorporate Social Security records and allow bulk searches, letting officials submit many voter records at once instead of checking each person separately.
Texas intervened in the case to support the administration and disputed claims that the expanded system was unreliable, Reuters reported.
As previously Texas used SAVE to compare its voter rolls with federal citizenship records and referred potential noncitizen matches to county registrars for verification
Those initial flags required follow-up; they did not establish that every person identified lacked citizenship or had voted illegally.
Federal records back voter checks
Trump directed the expansion through a March 2025 executive order instructing the Department of Homeland Security to help state and local officials verify the citizenship of registered voters and applicants. The order also directed the Social Security Administration to make records available for that purpose.
The League of Women Voters, the Electronic Privacy Information Center and other organizations challenged the changes, alleging violations of privacy and administrative laws. A federal district court blocked the modified program on June 22. Friday’s decision pauses that ruling.
The Supreme Court’s majority said federal immigration law authorizes DHS to obtain citizenship information from other agencies and requires it to answer state and local officials’ verification requests. The justices concluded that the challengers’ claims likely would fail.
“The order below prevents the Federal Government from using the program it believes is best suited to the task,” the majority wrote.
That assessment supported temporary relief for the administration. The Court did not issue a final ruling on the program’s legality.
Election safeguards remain
Federal law limits systematic voter-roll removals within 90 days of a federal election. The majority acknowledged that restriction limits the immediate effect of its order, but said officials may still conduct individual eligibility inquiries during that period.
The decision restores access to the expanded verification tool. It does not authorize mass voter purges or erase the legal requirements governing registration cancellations.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented, joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, the Court’s three liberal justices. Jackson argued that the data-sharing changes violated federal privacy protections and warned that outdated citizenship records could force eligible naturalized citizens to prove their status again or risk losing their registrations.
The majority also acknowledged evidence that Social Security records did not accurately reflect one challenger’s naturalization. Under the program described in the order, officials must contact a person for proof of citizenship when SAVE cannot confirm that status.
The stay remains in effect during the appeals process and any timely request for Supreme Court review. For now, it restores a tool the administration and supporting states sought to use to verify who qualifies to vote.
