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BALTIMORE, MD – Attorney General Anthony G. Brown today joined a coalition of 23 other states and the District of Columbia in suing the Trump administration over unlawful policy changes that would increase the administration’s access to the sensitive private information of millions of families who receive Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) benefits.
In June 2026, the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) issued a notice claiming to dramatically expand its oversight of state TANF programs, including by allowing ACF to share detailed records on TANF recipients with other federal agencies like the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Under ACF’s new policy, TANF recipients’ Social Security numbers, addresses, immigration status, and other sensitive personal data would be unlawfully shared across the federal government and potentially even with private organizations. Attorney General Brown and the coalition argue that ACF’s attempt to share millions of people’s data and implement new monitoring of states’ TANF programs violates the law and Constitution and is a blatant effort to politically target states and lawful recipients of critical TANF benefits.
“Families who rely on TANF to keep a roof over their children’s heads should not have to fear that their personal information will be shared across the federal government or used to target them,” said Attorney General Brown. “My Office will not stand by while this Administration unlawfully exposes Marylanders’ private data in an effort to intimidate vulnerable families out of benefits they are legally entitled to receive.”
Congress created TANF as part of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) of 1996. The law requires the federal government to provide block grants to states, territories, and tribal governments, which then have broad authority to use the funds for a variety of programs to provide assistance to low-income families with children. TANF funds support childcare subsidies, emergency housing for families fleeing domestic violence, emergency food assistance, support for grandparents caring for children, and other critical services. As Attorney General Brown and the coalition assert in their lawsuit, TANF is one of the largest sources of direct assistance to low-income families and a crucial part of states’ efforts to fight poverty. Maryland alone receives around $228 million per year in TANF funding, which, in Fiscal Year 2026, was used on average to support more than 38,000 participants each month (including nearly 12,000 adults and 27,000 children).
The law enacting TANF specifically requires states, not the federal government, to be responsible for verifying TANF applicants’ eligibility for benefits. Yet ACF now claims the agency has broad authority to oversee states’ TANF programs and share recipients’ private data with other federal agencies to double check their immigration status. Attorney General Brown and the coalition argue that this policy would cause significant harm to the vulnerable communities that rely on TANF funds. Allowing TANF recipients’ private data to be unlawfully shared across the federal government would erode trust that states’ TANF programs have built with immigrant communities and deter those lawfully qualified to receive benefits from seeking assistance. ACF’s policy could also lead to unlawful new oversight requirements from the federal government—diverting resources that should be used on critical programs to help low-income families.
Attorney General Brown and the coalition argue that ACF’s new policy violates the Administrative Procedure Act and the Spending Clause of the U.S. Constitution by ignoring restrictions on data sharing in TANF programs and enacting arbitrary new conditions on federal funding. The lawsuit seeks a court order declaring ACF’s policy unlawful and preventing it from being implemented.
Joining Attorney General Brown in filing this lawsuit are the attorneys general of Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaiʻi, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin, as well as the governors of Kentucky and Pennsylvania.
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