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BALTIMORE, MD – Attorney General Anthony G. Brown and a coalition of 24 attorneys general announced a U.S. District Court judge granted a preliminary injunction that blocks the Trump administration from demanding the production of a database of state-owned records containing the sensitive personal information of millions of commercial driver’s license (CDL) drivers and from terminating more than $10 million in federal funding to the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA) if it refuses to produce the database.
“Marylanders’ personal data, including their Social Security numbers, cannot be seized by the federal government without lawful justification,” said Attorney General Brown. “Today’s ruling stops this unlawful demand and protects millions of drivers while litigation continues.”
In August, Attorney General Brown and the coalition filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA), which is an administration of the DOT, and AAMVA, as well as an additional related lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The lawsuits claim the DOT, FMCSA, and DHS are violating multiple federal privacy laws by secretly setting up their own database with records extorted from AAMVA, with no guardrails on the use or sharing of drivers’ Social Security numbers and other personal information, and no notice to the public.
Just a week after Attorney General Brown and the coalition filed the lawsuits, the court issued a temporary restraining order, blocking the administration from obtaining this sensitive information while the court considered and ruled on the coalition’s motion for a preliminary injunction. The preliminary injunction blocks the demand as Attorney General Brown and the attorneys general continue to litigate the ongoing case.
Joining Attorney General Brown in filing these lawsuits 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 states of Kentucky and Pennsylvania.
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