MARCH 8, 2025
The Department of Health and Human Services has granted associates of the U.S. DOGE Service access to a sensitive child support database with troves of income data, overriding the objections of career employees, according to four people familiar with the matter.
The government database — created to help enforce child support payments and overseen by the Administration for Children and Families, or ACF — contains substantial amounts of personal income data linked to nearly all U.S. workers. The people spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.
An HHS official confirmed that DOGE received access to the system, saying that DOGE’s agents sought “read-only access” to the system and were required “to take all necessary trainings” before being granted permission to use it.
“ACF supports DOGE’s efforts to improve efficiency and data quality to reduce waste, fraud, and abuse in federal programs,” the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal operations, wrote in an email. “ACF will continue to assist DOGE in efforts to strengthen the programs it runs.”
DOGE has recently been trying to check personal tax records against federal benefits, grants and student loans, aiming to link together traditionally separated government systems in search of duplicative or wasteful payments. The Internal Revenue Service’s career staff has resisted DOGE’s request for access to taxpayer records, which are protected by federal law, but the child support database could provide another way for DOGE to obtain similar information. That database is also legally protected, but now DOGE officials have obtained authorization to access it.
A career civil servant had initially objected to allowing DOGE to access the child support database, but that person is no longer at the health department, according to three of the people familiar with the situation.
DOGE has defended its efforts to penetrate sensitive government systems as necessary to identify and cut government fraud and waste, but these requests have sparked alarm among civil servants who say they risk breaking federal law and compromising important safeguards. Some HHS officials told The Post that there already are safeguards in place to check for fraud using the ACF system, known as the Federal Parent Locator System. DOGE was particularly interested in a component of the system known as the National Directory of New Hires, which draws on data reported by employers and state agencies.
The White House previously referred comment on the matter to HHS.
Democrats demanded Friday that the Trump administration explain why DOGE was seeking to access the child-support database and for an accounting of how many workers and businesses “have had their confidential information received or accessed” by the Musk-led group.
“It is essentially an end-run around the confidential taxpayer information protected by the IRS,” Rep. Richard E. Neal (D-Massachusetts), the top Democrat on the House Ways and Means Committee, and colleagues wrote to HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent in a letter shared with The Washington Post. “No one, including DOGE, should be rummaging around in the confidential information of private citizens at any agency where the protected information resides.”
Courtesy/Source: Washington Post
