Hamadeh To Introduce Impeachment Articles Against Judge Who Blocked SAVE Voter Citizenship Checks

Arizona Republican Congressman Abe Hamadeh announced that he will introduce articles of impeachment against U.S. District Judge Sparkle L. Sooknanan after she ruled against the Trump administration’s expanded use of a federal citizenship-verification system for voter-roll checks.

Hamadeh, who represents Arizona’s 8th Congressional District, accused Sooknanan of overstepping her authority after her June 22 ruling in League of Women Voters v. U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which set aside the administration’s modified version of the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or SAVE, system.

“In her June 22 ruling blocking Trump’s SAVE database for voter citizenship checks, Judge Sparkle Sooknanan usurped President Trump’s executive authority, abused her power, undermined the judiciary, and disregarded separation of powers,” Hamadeh’s congressional office wrote on X. “Congressman Hamadeh’s articles of impeachment will hold her accountable.”

In her June 22 ruling blocking Trump's SAVE database for voter citizenship checks, Judge Sparkle Sooknanan usurped President Trump's executive authority, abused her power, undermined the judiciary, and disregarded separation of powers.

Congressman Hamadeh’s articles of…

— Office of Congressman Abe Hamadeh (@RepAbeHamadeh) July 7, 2026

Hamadeh separately wrote on his personal X account that he is “filing articles of impeachment” against Sooknanan, accusing her of a “power grab” against President Donald Trump.

I'm filing articles of impeachment against "Judge" Sparkle L. Sooknanan.

Her power grab against President Trump cannot be tolerated. Rogue judges like her are destroying the rule of law while communists undermine America.

We have the RIGHT to know that only AMERICANS are voting… pic.twitter.com/8bATJM3h2f

— Abe Hamadeh (@AbrahamHamadeh) July 6, 2026

 “We have the RIGHT to know that only AMERICANS are voting,” Hamadeh wrote.

In a subsequent post to X, Hamadeh said he plans to introduce the impeachment articles Thursday and accused Sooknanan of issuing “a blatant and unlawful subversion of the President’s executive authority and a direct assault on election integrity.” 

Judge Sparkle L. Sooknanan’s egregious overreaching ruling blocking President Trump’s common-sense effort to verify the citizenship of those who want to vote in our elections was the final straw.

It was a blatant and unlawful subversion of the President’s executive authority and… pic.twitter.com/ezoLJJhiba

— Office of Congressman Abe Hamadeh (@RepAbeHamadeh) July 7, 2026

Sooknanan, a judge on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, was nominated by President Joe Biden on Feb. 27, 2024, confirmed by the U.S. Senate on Dec. 3, 2024, and received her commission on Jan. 2, 2025, according to the Federal Judicial Center. 

The case centered on the Trump administration’s 2025 overhaul of SAVE, a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services program used by government agencies to verify immigration status and U.S. citizenship. USCIS says SAVE helps agencies verify status but does not determine a person’s eligibility for a specific benefit or license. 

In her 75-page memorandum opinion, Sooknanan wrote that the administration’s SAVE overhaul modified the system in three major ways: adding records of natural-born citizens, allowing access to Social Security Administration records, including Social Security numbers, and permitting bulk searches by SAVE users. 

The lawsuit was brought by the League of Women Voters, state League affiliates, the Electronic Privacy Information Center, and five individual plaintiffs against DHS, the Social Security Administration, the Department of Justice, and agency officials. The plaintiffs argued the data consolidation violated the Administrative Procedure Act, the Privacy Act of 1974, the Social Security Act, and constitutional separation-of-powers principles. 

Sooknanan ruled that the modified SAVE system and related 2025 system-of-records notices were unlawful for three reasons: they violated the Social Security Act, violated substantive and procedural protections in the Privacy Act, and were arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedure Act. The court granted the plaintiffs’ motion for summary judgment, denied motions from the federal defendants and Texas, and vacated the modified SAVE system described in DHS records.

“The federal government has knowingly trampled on the privacy rights of American citizens in a manner that threatens the sacred right to vote,” Sooknanan wrote in the opinion. “This Court cannot stand idly by while that happens.” 

The ruling did not eliminate the original SAVE program. Rather, it set aside the modified system created under the administration’s 2025 changes. Votebeat reported that the ruling blocked the Trump administration’s overhaul of the DHS system while leaving the decades-old immigration-verification program itself in place. 

The ruling drew attention in Arizona because state Senate President Warren Petersen filed an amicus brief Monday supporting a stay in the case, arguing that elections were already underway and that the public interest favored maintaining existing election-related processes while an appeal proceeded. He wrote, via Instagram, “Today, I filed an amicus brief in the DC district court supporting DHS’s efforts to ensure that only citizens are voting in our elections. It may not surprise you that the ACLU is in opposition.”

 The Washington Examiner reported that Petersen’s brief cited the government’s position that state and local agencies rely on the modified SAVE system to maintain accurate voter-registration lists and verify eligibility. 

Removing a federal judge requires impeachment by a majority vote of the U.S. House and conviction by a two-thirds vote in the U.S. Senate. The Washington Examiner noted that only eight federal judges have been removed through impeachment in U.S. history. 

Hamadeh’s announced impeachment push comes amid broader Republican criticism of federal district court rulings blocking Trump administration policies on immigration and elections.

The Department of Justice is expected to appeal Sooknanan’s ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, yet a conflicting opinion was issued in a federal court.

Yesterday a federal judge in Florida issued a ruling on behalf of DHS allowing four Republican-led states to access federal voter registration data to verify their voter rolls. As reported in the NY Times:

In a concise 10-page opinion, Judge T. Kent Wetherell II of the Federal District Court for the Northern District of Florida, a Trump appointee, wrote that under the legal agreement from last year, the Homeland Security Department had agreed with Florida officials to cooperate on “improving and modernizing” a federal citizenship database, including by integrating Social Security data. As part of that, he wrote, the department agreed to allow bulk searches of the database submitted by state officials.

In addition to Florida, the attorneys general of Ohio, Iowa and Indiana had joined the case last year, making those states subject to the order on Tuesday.

Judge Wetherell wrote in his opinion on Tuesday: “The court understands that this puts defendants in a bind because they are subject to two contradictory orders — one from this court requiring them to include certain features in the SAVE system and one from Judge Sooknanan prohibiting them from doing so. One of the orders has to give.”

“This court is not bound by Judge Sooknanan’s order, and with all due respect, the court disagrees with the conclusions in that order,” he added.