The Department of Justice filed separate civil lawsuits on June 26, 2026, against Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Minnesota, seeking federal court injunctions that would require each state's SNAP administering agency to produce five years of applicant data to the U.S. Department of Agriculture [1]. The government contends the data is necessary to detect fraud, identify improper payments, and recover overpayments in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program [1].
The suits rest on federal statutory authority over SNAP, which conditions state participation in the program on compliance with USDA oversight requirements [1]. According to the DOJ, USDA made repeated data requests beginning in 2025, and 28 other states complied [1]. The four defendant states refused, prompting referral to the DOJ Civil Division and its National Fraud Enforcement Division [1]. Attorney General Todd Blanche, Associate Attorney General Brett A. Shumate, and Assistant Attorney General Colin M. McDonald are listed among the principal federal actors overseeing the litigation [1]. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins has publicly framed the data requests as a core anti-fraud measure [1].
The states have not accepted the federal characterization. Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison indicated his office would resist the lawsuit, arguing the disclosure raises privacy concerns for SNAP recipients [2]. Minnesota's Department of Children, Youth, and Families administers the state's SNAP program and is the named defendant in the Minnesota action [2]. The Star Tribune reported that Ellison's office views the data demand as overbroad and potentially inconsistent with state privacy obligations [2]. The other defendant states, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and Michigan, face parallel complaints filed the same day [1].
The litigation presents a direct test of how far federal spending-clause authority extends when states resist administrative data requests tied to a federally funded benefit program. If the federal government prevails, it would establish a precedent that states participating in SNAP cannot selectively comply with USDA data directives, even when those directives implicate large volumes of personally identifiable information. If the states prevail, courts would need to define the outer boundary of federal oversight power, potentially requiring USDA to narrow or reframe future requests. No hearing dates have been publicly set, and motions practice in each of the four cases is expected to address threshold questions of sovereign immunity and statutory preemption before any merits determination.