Attorney General Mayes Wins Court Order Protecting SNAP Recipients’ Sensitive Personal Information

PHOENIX – Attorney General Kris Mayes won an important victory in the case to protect the privacy of millions of people throughout the country who rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) for food assistance. In a lawsuit brought by Attorney General Mayes and a coalition of 20 other attorneys general and the state of Kentucky, the District Court for the Northern District of California ordered a temporary restraining order preventing the Trump administration from demanding states turn over personal information of all residents who receive SNAP.

"I'm glad I was able to help put a stop to this obviously illegal and harmful attempt to scrape up the protected personal data of Arizona residents who receive SNAP benefits," said Attorney General Mayes. "In case after case that we've filed to stop the federal government's overreach, the courts are siding with us." 

Attorney General Mayes and the coalition sued the administration in July, arguing that this highly sensitive data, which includes home addresses, Social Security numbers, recent locations, immigration statuses, and more, would likely be shared across federal agencies and used for immigration enforcement, in violation of the law. While non-citizens are generally not eligible for SNAP benefits, federal law allows non-citizen parents to apply for SNAP benefits on behalf of their citizen children. 

Both federal and state laws prohibit states from disclosing personally identifying SNAP data except under narrow circumstances. The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), which administers SNAP, has requested that states submit personally identifying information, including names, dates of birth, personal addresses, and Social Security numbers, of all SNAP applicants and recipients since January 2020. The USDA has threatened states with potential SNAP funding cuts if they refuse to comply. As a result of USDA’s new demand, states have been put in the impossible position of either violating the law by complying, or protecting their residents’ personal information while jeopardizing millions of dollars in funding used to administer the SNAP program. 

In a temporary restraining order, the District Court blocked USDA’s demand for the plaintiff states to turn over SNAP recipients’ data and prevented USDA from withholding SNAP funding.  

Joining Attorney General Mayes in filing the lawsuit are the attorneys general of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington, Wisconsin, and the District of Columbia, as well as the state of Kentucky.