HHS Grants DOGE Access To Child Support Database, Overriding Objections

RFK — Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. watches as President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Oval Office on Feb. 25, 2025. The health department has granted the U.S. DOGE Service access to a sensitive income database maintained by the agency's child support office. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

By Jeff Stein and Dan Diamond

The Department of Health and Human Services has granted associates of the U.S. DOGE Service access to a sensitive child support database with troves of income data, overriding the objections of career employees, according to four people familiar with the matter.

The government database — created to help enforce child support payments and overseen by the Administration for Children and Families, or ACF — contains substantial amounts of personal income data linked to nearly all U.S. workers. The people spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.

An HHS official confirmed that DOGE received access to the system, saying that DOGE’s agents sought “read-only access” to the system and were required “to take all necessary trainings” before being granted permission to use it.

“ACF supports DOGE’s efforts to improve efficiency and data quality to reduce waste, fraud, and abuse in federal programs,” the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal operations, wrote in an email. “ACF will continue to assist DOGE in efforts to strengthen the programs it runs.”

DOGE has recently been trying to check personal tax records against federal benefits, grants and student loans, aiming to link together traditionally separated government systems in search of duplicative or wasteful payments. The Internal Revenue Service’s career staff has resisted DOGE’s request for access to taxpayer records, which are protected by federal law, but the child support database could provide another way for DOGE to obtain similar information. That database is also legally protected, but now DOGE officials have obtained authorization to access it.

A career civil servant had initially objected to allowing DOGE to access the child support database, but that person is no longer at the health department, according to three of the people familiar with the situation.

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