Biden-appointed judge hands Letitia James setback in latest Trump legal clash

New York Attorney General Letitia James' legal battle against President Donald Trump over DOGE-linked access to sensitive Treasury systems ended Wednesday with a federal judge dismissing the lawsuit she spearheaded with 18 other states.

The case stems from Trump's January 2025 executive order establishing DOGE, which directed executive agencies to create DOGE teams and set July 4, 2026, as the termination date for the U.S. DOGE Service Temporary Organization.

James led a coalition - which included New York and 18 other states - that sued the following month after Treasury gave DOGE-affiliated employees access to Bureau of the Fiscal Service systems, which process federal payments and contain sensitive financial information.

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Biden-appointed U.S. District Judge Jeannette Vargas ruled that the "plaintiffs' claims related to access by DOGE-affiliated employees to sensitive Treasury information are dismissed as moot," according to Wednesday's order.

Vargas said the Treasury DOGE team had been disbanded, and no DOGE employees remained at Treasury, leaving no access practice for the court to enjoin. She separately dismissed the states' claims over an automated payment-review system, finding they had not alleged that the process froze or canceled any specific federal payment due to them.

The states argued the Trump administration unlawfully opened sensitive Treasury systems to DOGE, putting state financial information and federal payments at risk and exceeding the administration's legal authority.

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In February 2025, Vargas granted the states a preliminary injunction barring Treasury's DOGE team from the covered payment systems, then modified the order over the following months to permit access for personnel who complied with specified vetting, training, hiring, reporting and mitigation procedures.

The Executive Order established DOGE and called for each department to assemble its own DOGE team to find fraud, waste and abuse before their termination date of July 4.

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James has been a longtime critic and legal adversary of Trump, launching a civil fraud lawsuit against him and the Trump Organization in 2022 after campaigning on investigating his business practices.

The case initially resulted in more than $450 million in penalties, though an appeals court later upheld Trump's liability while voiding the financial penalty.

Fox News Digital reached out to the White House and the office of the New York attorney general for comment.