As DOJ prepares to share state voter data with DHS, a key privacy officer resigns

## Summary
Law As DOJ prepares to share state voter data with DHS, a key privacy officer resigns April 3, 2026 5:00 AM ET By Jude Joffe-Block A banner featuring an image of President Trump is displayed on the facade of the Department of Justice headquarters in Washington, DC. Drew Angerer/AFP via Getty Images hide caption toggle caption Drew Angerer/AFP via Getty Images As Justice Department officials are working to acquire sensitive voter registration data from states and have recently disclosed a plan to share it with the Department of Homeland Security , a key privacy officer in DOJ's division tasked with enforcing civil and voting rights laws has resigned. Elections The Justice Department plans to share sensitive voter data with Homeland Security Kilian Kagle was the chief FOIA officer and senior component official for privacy for DOJ's Civil Rights Division before leaving his post in recent days. District Judge David Carter specifically noted in his January ruling that DOJ's demand violated various federal privacy laws, as well as California state privacy law, a concern that has also been raised by states and privacy experts. "The Department of Justice has no legal authority to maintain a massive database of state voter records in the first place," said John Davisson, deputy director and director of enforcement at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a nonprofit dedicated to privacy rights. "It's an unlawful and inexcusable abuse of sensitive voter data, and no amount of artful paperwork can fix that.

## Article Content
Law
As DOJ prepares to share state voter data with DHS, a key privacy officer resigns
April 3, 2026
5:00 AM ET
By
Jude Joffe-Block
A banner featuring an image of President Trump is displayed on the facade of the Department of Justice headquarters in Washington, DC. The Justice Department has been trying to force states to hand over sensitive voter data that it plans to share with the Department of Homeland Security.
Drew Angerer/AFP via Getty Images
hide caption
toggle caption
Drew Angerer/AFP via Getty Images
As Justice Department officials are working to acquire sensitive voter registration data from states and have recently disclosed a plan to
share it with the Department of Homeland Security
, a key privacy officer in DOJ's division tasked with enforcing civil and voting rights laws has resigned.
Elections
The Justice Department plans to share sensitive voter data with Homeland Security
Kilian Kagle was the chief FOIA officer and senior component official for privacy for DOJ's Civil Rights Division before leaving his post in recent days. His resignation has not been previously reported.
For nearly a year, the DOJ has been making
unprecedented demands for sensitive voter data
from most states – including voters' driver's license numbers, partial Social Security numbers, dates of birth and addresses – that some say violate privacy law.
Elections
Trump's DOJ makes its most sweeping demand for election data yet
In some cases, like in California, the demands went further, to include party affiliation and voting history. The agency has said it needs this data to ensure states are performing voter list maintenance and removing ineligible registrants. DOJ has sued more than two dozen states that have not turned over their voter lists.
The Justice Department's efforts to acquire this voter data come as the Trump administration
is investigating 2020 election results
and continues to elevate unfounded conspiracy theories about the prevalence of election fraud, which has been shown to be rare.
Last week, Eric Neff, acting chief of the Justice Department's voting section, said at a hearing in Rhode Island that his agency's intent is to share state voter roll data with the Department of Homeland Security and run it through a
DHS data system called SAVE
to check for noncitizens and deceased individuals on the rolls.
Politics
The Trump administration is building a national citizenship data system
While the DOJ's cases are still pending in most states, federal judges in California, Oregon and Michigan have so far dismissed the DOJ's demands for sensitive state voter data, finding that the federal government was not entitled to the records under the law. Under the Constitution, states administer their own elections, and voter data has always belonged to the states.
In the California case, U.S. District Judge David Carter specifically noted in his January ruling that DOJ's demand violated various federal privacy laws, as well as California state privacy law, a concern that has also been raised by states and privacy experts.
"The Department of Justice has no legal authority to maintain a massive database of state voter records in the first place," said John Davisson, deputy director and director of enforcement at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a nonprofit dedicated to privacy rights.
"It's an unlawful and inexcusable abuse of sensitive voter data, and no amount of artful paperwork can fix that. Still, it's telling that DOJ hasn't even gone through the motions yet of publishing basic privacy documentation required by law," Davisson said.
DOJ hasn't issued notices or privacy assessments for its data requests
So far, 17 mostly Republican-led states have turned over their voter rolls to the Justice Department, according to the agency. Yet DOJ has not issued any public notices or privacy assessments about this new data collection nor its plans to share the data with DHS.
Federal privacy laws require such documents before a federal agency collects or disseminates personal, identifiable information about the public for a new purpose. The documents are typically issued in collaboration with the agency or division's designated privacy officer.
Kagle declined NPR's request to comment but confirmed he had recently resigned. He issued a
privacy impact assessment
for an unrelated DOJ case management database as recently as March 20.
Neff, the acting chief of the voting section, said at the Rhode Island hearing that DOJ has yet to do anything with the voter data it collected from 17 states because, "there are still a couple steps we have to go through before the United States is comfortable proceeding and comfortable representing to this court that we're in full compliance with the Privacy Act."
Still, Justin Levitt, a law professor at Loyola Marymount University Law School who also served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the DOJ's Civil Rights Division and an adviser on voting rights issues for the Biden administra

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## Expert Analysis

### Merits
N/A

### Areas for Consideration
- District Judge David Carter specifically noted in his January ruling that DOJ's demand violated various federal privacy laws, as well as California state privacy law, a concern that has also been raised by states and privacy experts. "The Department of Justice has no legal authority to maintain a massive database of state voter records in the first place," said John Davisson, deputy director and director of enforcement at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a nonprofit dedicated to privacy rights. "It's an unlawful and inexcusable abuse of sensitive voter data, and no amount of artful paperwork can fix that.
- Neff, the acting chief of the voting section, said at the Rhode Island hearing that DOJ has yet to do anything with the voter data it collected from 17 states because, "there are still a couple steps we have to go through before the United States is comfortable proceeding and comfortable representing to this court that we're in full compliance with the Privacy Act." Still, Justin Levitt, a law professor at Loyola Marymount University Law School who also served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the DOJ's Civil Rights Division and an adviser on voting rights issues for the Biden administration, said it is a problem that DOJ now possesses the data without public notice and transparency about how the data would be used and stored, as is required by the Privacy Act.
- The former chief data officer of the Social Security Administration, Charles Borges, became a whistleblower and resigned out of concern about data practices by Department of Government Efficiency staffers with sensitive Social Security data.

### Implications
- He issued a privacy impact assessment for an unrelated DOJ case management database as recently as March 20.
- When Neff said "No," McElroy asked if he was sure. "Good question, your Honor, because the Civil Rights Division cannot promise what any other agency will or will not do," Neff acknowledged.
- Experts say he lacks the authority Separately, an executive order that President Trump signed this week to limit mail-in voting tasks DHS with coming up with a list of eligible voters in each state, though many legal experts expect the order will be blocked by federal courts.

### Expert Commentary
This article covers data, voter, privacy topics. Areas of concern are also raised. Readability: Flesch-Kincaid grade 0.0. Word count: 1510.