The Trump administration came to the Supreme Court on Wednesday morning, once again asking the justices to take action on their emergency docket. U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer urged the court to temporarily pause an order by a federal judge in Washington, D.C., that would require the Department of Government Efficiency to provide information in a lawsuit filed under the Freedom of Information Act. Sauer told the justices that requiring DOGE as a “presidential advisory body” to respond to the plaintiffs’ requests, a process known as discovery, “clearly violates the separation of powers” and “will significantly distract” from DOGE’s “mission of identifying and eliminating fraud, waste, and abuse in the federal government.”
The Trump administration’s request on Wednesday stems from a Jan. 24 request made under FOIA by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a government watchdog group. CREW sought, among other things, communications between the DOGE administrator, Amy Gleason, and DOGE staff, as well as financial disclosures submitted by DOGE personnel.
On Feb. 20, CREW filed a lawsuit under FOIA in federal court in Washington, D.C. It sought documents that, according to CREW, it wanted before Congress passed a bill to fund the federal government.
As the case comes to the court on Wednesday, it centers on CREW’s request for expedited discovery to determine whether DOGE is an “agency” that must comply with FOIA. CREW asked to depose Gleason as well as for a list of government contracts and grants that DOGE recommended be canceled, a list of employees and positions that DOGE recommended be terminated, and a list of current and former DOGE employees.
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