Supreme Court to hear Trump bid to keep DOGE records secret

The US Supreme Court agreed on Tuesday to hear the Trump administration's appeal against open-records rulings covering Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency. The case will decide whether the Freedom of Information Act reaches an entity that cut federal budgets for a year while operating without congressional oversight.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a watchdog group, sued for access to records from Musk's time leading DOGE, arguing that FOIA applied. A federal judge agreed; so did an appellate court. In June 2025 the Supreme Court intervened, sending the suit back to narrow the scope of the records requests. When the case began advancing again, the administration appealed — and the justices have now agreed to review it during their current term, likely at the start of next year.

The administration argues the lower court decision 'intrudes into the autonomy and confidentiality of presidential advisers and augurs time-consuming and burdensome discovery litigation'. DOGE's stated purpose was cutting wasteful spending, and its cuts often landed on spending priorities opposed by both Trump and Musk. The largest fell on the US Agency for International Development, which ran foreign aid projects around the world; a former USAID administrator estimates that more than 700,000 deaths are attributable to DOGE's cuts through July 2026.

Musk has spent around $366 million on this year's midterm elections in support of Republican candidates backing Trump's agenda. In a recent interview with The Economist he said he 'got a little too involved in politics, got carried away, frankly'. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has since placed him on a three-person panel examining the future of technology for the US military. Musk regularly seeks, and is often granted, billion-dollar contracts with the government.

Trump has claimed to be 'the most transparent' chief executive in US history. The court will hear the case early next year.