(WEAA)— Maryland Attorney General Anthony G. Brown has joined a coalition of 17 attorneys general in suing the Trump administration over new data reporting requirements that they say jeopardize student privacy and threaten colleges and universities with baseless investigations.
At the center of the lawsuit is a new component added to the Integrated Postsecondary Education System, a mandatory federal survey that collects data from colleges and universities participating in federal financial aid programs. In August 2025, President Trump issued a memo directing the survey to track whether institutions were complying with the Supreme Court's 2023 ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, which prohibits colleges from using race as a factor in admissions.
Following the memo, Education Secretary Linda McMahon announced institutions would be required to report data broken down by race and sex and retroactively submit seven years worth of data. The deadline for compliance is March 18.
Brown and the coalition argue the rushed rollout left critical terms undefined, putting universities at risk of costly penalties for unintentional errors. They also argue the requirements put sensitive student information at risk of exposure, and that the administration's gutting of Education Department staff has left universities without guidance on how to comply.
Brown said the mandate puts Maryland's colleges and universities in an impossible position, forcing them to choose between federal penalties or complying with vague rules that could expose student data to a federal government he says has shown it will weaponize that information.
The coalition includes attorneys general from California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Wisconsin and Washington.
This story was produced with AI assistance and edited by WEAA News Staff.