This post was updated April 5 at 9:46 p.m.

A federal judge blocked the Trump administration Friday from requiring California universities to share the personal data of applicants and admitted students with the federal government.

The federal government began its push for the data – including race, gender, test scores and grade point averages – after alleging that universities in Democratic-led states, including California, have illegally used affirmative action in their admission processes. California was one of 17 states to file suit against the Trump administration over its demands for applicants’ data from the past seven years.

The U.S. Supreme Court declared affirmative action in college admissions unconstitutional in 2023, but it has been illegal in California even longer – since 1997.

F. Dennis Saylor IV, a judge in the U.S. District Court of Massachusetts, issued a preliminary injunction Friday to prevent the federal government from imposing any deadlines for state colleges to submit their applicants’ data. The decision followed the federal government granting universities an extension to submit their data through a survey from the U.S. Department of Education from March 25 to April 6.

The UC and California State University systems said in court filings that the data request was rushed, vague and risked student privacy, according to the Los Angeles Times. Saylor agreed with the university systems in the ruling, writing that the federal government rushed the disclosure process and failed to address concerns about the timeline.

The Trump administration claimed that UCLA allowed affirmative action – as well as antisemitism and “men to participate in women’s sports” – in letters justifying its choice to suspend $584 million in federal research funding from UCLA in late July. Chancellor Julio Frenk denied the federal government’s allegations in a January interview.

[Related: Q&A: Julio Frenk condemns federal cuts, pledges future budget transparency]

While a California federal district judge restored much of the once-frozen funding, the U.S. Department of Justice has since joined a lawsuit against the David Geffen School of Medicine, accusing it of illegally considering race in its admissions.

[Related: DOJ seeks to join lawsuit against David Geffen School of Medicine]

The federal government has said that the UC has not made efforts to comply with the requested survey, which Saylor said in his decision is untrue. UC Office of the President Media Relations did not respond in time for a request for comment on if the University has submitted any of the requested data.

“Defendants allege that delay will increase the risk that data will not be available for collection, as plaintiffs may destroy records currently in their possession,” Saylor said in the decision. “The Court will order plaintiffs to retain records that are responsive to the ACTS survey for the duration of this litigation.”