U.S. DOGE Service v. United States District Court for the District of Columbia

The President created the U.S. DOGE Service (USDS) by executive order on January 20, 2025, placing it within the Executive Office of the President. USDS is led by an Administrator who reports to the White House Chief of Staff, and the President’s executive orders task USDS with advising the President and consulting with federal agencies on modernizing federal technology and improving government efficiency. USDS has no authorizing statute; executive orders alone define its responsibilities. The same founding order also directed each federal agency to establish internal DOGE Teams composed of agency employees who report to their own agency leadership, not to USDS, as part of the broader government efficiency initiative.

Four days after USDS was established, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to USDS seeking broad categories of records, including all communications between the USDS Administrator and USDS staff and all communications with any federal agency. CREW then filed suit. The district court initially ruled that USDS was likely subject to FOIA as a covered agency, and after USDS moved for summary judgment on that threshold question, CREW sought expedited pre-judgment discovery. CREW’s requests included internal directives, detailed information about all USDS and agency DOGE team employees, records of any plans to access classified databases, and a deposition of the USDS Administrator. The district court granted most of those requests, reasoning that information about USDS’s practical influence over federal agencies was relevant to whether USDS exercised authority beyond merely advising the President.

The district court granted the discovery requests in April 2025, and the government sought emergency relief from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (D.C. Circuit), which denied it; the Supreme Court then vacated that denial and remanded with instructions to narrow the discovery order in light of separation-of-powers concerns. After CREW withdrew some requests on remand, the D.C. Circuit again denied the government relief without fresh analysis of the remaining discovery.