Florida court orders DHS to restore SAVE voter-verification access as appeal continues

A federal judge in Florida has ordered the Department of Homeland Security to restore two features of a federal database that Florida says it uses to help verify the citizenship or immigration status of registered voters.

The July 7 order from U.S. District Judge T. Kent Wetherell II requires DHS to reinstate access to bulk uploads and searches using full or partial Social Security numbers in the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or SAVE, system. The order also required the parties to file a status report within seven days.

The order directed DHS to act. It did not, by itself, establish that the features were fully restored, that Florida completed new voter-roll checks or that any voter was removed from the rolls.

Why the order matters to Florida

Florida told the Northern District of Florida that disabling the features impaired its ability to comply with state laws requiring citizenship verification for registered voters. Bulk uploads allow agencies to submit multiple requests instead of entering them one at a time. Social Security-number searches provide another way to submit an inquiry when a unique immigration identifier is not available.

USCIS describes SAVE as an electronic system that government agencies use to verify immigration status and related information. In this dispute, the database is being used as a government verification tool. It does not automatically determine that a person is ineligible to vote or remove a registration.

How the dispute began

Florida filed the case in October 2024, arguing that SAVE was inadequate because it required a unique immigration identifier and did not allow inquiries using a Social Security number, driver’s license number or similar identifier.

Florida, Ohio, Iowa and Indiana reached a settlement with DHS in November 2025. The agreement required DHS to add searches using full and last-four-digit Social Security numbers and to process bulk-upload verification requests. The Florida court approved and incorporated the agreement into its dismissal order and retained jurisdiction for 20 years to enforce it.

According to the Florida court’s July 7 order, DHS operated the bulk-upload and Social Security-number functions from December 2025 until June 2026. The agency disabled them on June 23, one day after a separate federal judge in Washington, D.C., vacated the SAVE modifications.

Two district courts reached conflicting conclusions

Judge Sparkle L. Sooknanan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled on June 22 that the modified SAVE system conflicted with the Social Security Act and the Privacy Act. The D.C. court kept the suspension in place while related appeals proceeded.

Judge Wetherell reached a different conclusion in the Florida case. He ruled that the settlement remained enforceable even though DHS had disabled the features to comply with the D.C. order. He also expressly disagreed with Judge Sooknanan’s statutory analysis, concluding that the SAVE modifications did not violate either federal law.

The Florida order acknowledged that DHS faced two contradictory federal orders. It nevertheless directed the agency to comply with the Florida settlement and left it to DHS to determine how to do so.

The appeal remains active

The League of Women Voters and the Electronic Privacy Information Center, which intervened in the Florida case, filed a notice of appeal on July 20 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.

Florida’s July 28 filing opposed a request to expedite the appeal. The state argued that the case raises novel questions about the legality of the settlement obligations, whether the organizations have standing to intervene or appeal and whether the enforcement order is immediately appealable.

That filing reflects Florida’s position; it is not an Eleventh Circuit decision. As of Aug. 3, no appellate court had resolved the conflict between the Florida and D.C. district-court rulings.

What Floridians should not infer

The current record establishes that DHS was ordered to restore Florida’s access to the bulk-upload and Social Security-number search functions. It does not independently establish that technical restoration was completed, that Florida conducted new voter-roll checks or that any registration changed as a result.

For Florida voters, the practical status remains unsettled. The federal government and the courts are dealing with competing orders, and the Eleventh Circuit appeal could affect whether the July 7 enforcement order remains in force. The legal and administrative status of the SAVE modifications should not be treated as final.

Sources

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