The New York federal judge overseeing another judge’s emergency injunction barring unauthorized access the Treasury Department’s central payment on Tuesday denied the Trump administration’s request to vacate the temporary restrictions, which prevent billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency from accessing sensitive personal data stored on department servers.
“In entering the TRO, it was Judge Engelmayer’s clear intention, as had been requested, to maintain the status quo that existed prior to the adoption of the agency action described in the complaint until such time as a hearing could be held on the preliminary injunction motion,” U.S. District Judge Jeannette Vargas wrote in her opinion denying the administration’s request to vacate the restriction before a hearing scheduled on Friday.
Vargas clarified that the secretary of the Treasury and other Senate-confirmed senior Treasury officers are not prohibited from accessing Treasury’s payment system while Engelmayer’s order is in effect. Neither are contractors who were approved by the Department of Treasury’s chief information officer and engaged before Jan. 20, 2025, to perform routine or emergency maintenance on Bureau of the Fiscal Service systems.
Engelmayer also carved out an exemption for the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City “to access BFS payment systems as it did prior to Jan. 20, 2025.”
The temporary restraining order will continue to halt Musk’s so-called DOGE engineers from accessing the system….
Led by New York Attorney General Letitia James, the coalition of 19 of states seek a declaration that Treasury Department’s policy change is unlawful and unconstitutional, and to permanently block the Trump administration from implementing the Treasury’s new policy of allowing access to its Bureau of Fiscal Services payment systems containing sensitive personal information.
The states claim the Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle government policies through expanded access to the sensitive data exceeds the Treasury’s statutory authority and violates the Administrative Procedures Act, separation of powers doctrine and the take care clause of the U.S. Constitution.
The order, signed by the Barack Obama-appointed Engelmayer, drew an impermissible distinction between “civil servants” and “political appointees,” the Trump administration argued in its petition to vacate.
Lambert here: “An impermissible distinction between civil servants and political appointees.” Hmm.
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