A University of California group representing undergraduates across nine campuses is suing the U.S. Department of Education, accusing it of illegally giving DOGE, the advisory group led by Elon Musk, access to private financial aid data.
The suit by the UC Student Assn. was filed Monday in U.S District Court in Washington, D.C., and alleges that the education department is violating the Privacy Act of 1974, which broadly bars it from sharing personal information with third parties. It asks a federal judge to halt the alleged access of Department of Government Efficiency affiliates have to student data.
Aditi Hariharan, president of the UC Student Assn., said in a statement students “did not consent to having our personal information shared with an unelected and noncongressionally approved entity.”
The suit comes as tensions are growing over the future of the department, which gives out billions in grants for K-12 schooling programs and administers more than $1.5 trillion in federal student loans for 43 million Americans. Trump has pledged to eliminate the department and said this week that he wants his education secretary nominee, Linda McMahon, to “put herself out of a job” McMahon’s Senate confirmation hearing is scheduled for Thursday.
Reached Friday, a spokesman for the education department said that it does not comment on pending litigation.
The spokesman did not respond to a follow-up question about whether DOGE members had access to the department or financial aid information. A report this week in the Washington Post, citing anonymous sources, said roughly 20 members of Musk’s team were were working within the department.
Speaking to The Times on Friday, a career civil servant in education said it was “widely known” that DOGE had department access. The person spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to talk to media.
The possibility that private financial information is being accessed by DOGE has alarmed students.
“When students apply for financial aid, they enter their Social Security number on an application, or agree to take out a federal loan, they are trusting that their information will be secure,” said Hariharan, a UC Davis senior majoring in political science and nutrition science. “Releasing student loan borrowers’ personal data is an incredible betrayal by our government.”
The National Student Legal Defense Network and the Public Citizen Litigation Group are representing the student association.
“Defendants’ action granting DOGE-affiliated individuals continuous and ongoing access to that information for an unspecified period of time means that millions of Americans from all walks of life have no assurance that their sensitive information — and that of their parents and/or spouses — will receive the protection that federal law affords,” said the suit, filed against Acting Education Secretary Denise Carter and the department.
“Because defendants’ actions and decisions are shrouded in secrecy, individuals do not have even basic information about what personal or financial information defendants are sharing with outside parties or how their information is being used,” it added.
On Friday, dozens of Congressional Democrats led by California members said they were shut out of education headquarters after showing up to protest Trump’s stated goal of shutting down the department and DOGE’s reported access to information.
The group of at least 30 representatives — including California’s Mark Takano (D-Riverside), Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles), Luz Rivas (D-Los Angeles) and Lateefah Simon (D-Oakland) — said they came to the building after writing to the acting education secretary to demand a meeting over Trump’s education plans.
Takano, a Democrat on the Republican-led House Committee on Education and the Workforce, said in an interview that it was “an outrage that billionaire Elon Musk can get his minions into the department but that we, members of Congress who have an oversight role, cannot.”
“Musk was never elected to anything, never confirmed by the Senate,” said Takano, who represents parts of Riverside County.
Asked about the congressional representatives, the Education Department spokesman said “the protest was organized by members of Congress who were exercising their 1st Amendment rights, which they are at liberty to do. They did not have any scheduled appointments.”
During a news briefing Friday, Trump criticized the lawmakers.
“I see the same ones. I see Maxine Waters, a low life. I see, you know, all these people,” he said. “They don’t love our country. They don’t love our country. We want great education,” he said before saying he wanted education to “go back to the states.”
Asked this week if he would issue an executive order to dismantle the department, Trump said: “ I think I’d work with Congress … We’d have to work with the teachers union because the teachers union is the only one that is opposed to it.”
Democrats and some Republicans have questioned whether the president has the authority to do away with a federal department. Congress created the department under President Carter and gives it federal funding via its appropriations role.
There are also legal questions regarding whether the president can unilaterally transfer functions from one branch of government to another, such as moving student loans oversight to the Treasury Department or civil rights enforcement to the Justice Department.
If congressional approval is needed to shut down the education department, Republicans have only narrow majorities in the House and Senate and a Democratic-led filibuster in the Senate could block the move.
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