The Justice Department sued six states on Tuesday, Delaware, Maryland, New Mexico, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington, after they refused to turn in their voter registration rolls.
The complaints were filed in federal courts by the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division, which argued that the states violated federal laws, such as the National Voter Registration Act and the Help America Vote Act, which require states to have proper and effective voter registration and list maintenance programs, and the Civil Rights Act of 1960, which requires states to make their voter registration rolls available for inspection.
“Accurate voter rolls are the cornerstone of fair and free elections, and too many states have fallen into a pattern of noncompliance with basic voter roll maintenance,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said. “The Department of Justice will continue filing proactive election integrity litigation until states comply with basic election safeguards.”
Harmeet Dhillon, assistant attorney general for the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division, said, “States that continue to defy federal voting laws interfere with our mission of ensuring that Americans have accurate voter lists as they go to the polls, that every vote counts equally, and that all voters have confidence in election results.”
The lawsuit follows a Sept. 8 request from the DOJ, which asked the states to turn in their active voter registration rolls. The states allegedly ignored the request.
The suit, which targets senior election officials and secretaries of state, argues that the DOJ has the authority to demand the production, inspection, and analysis of voter registration data to ensure compliance with federal law.
The DOJ asked the court to issue a direct order to each state to provide full disclosure of voter registration data, including names, birth dates, driver’s license numbers, and partial Social Security numbers.
The recent lawsuits add to President Donald Trump’s efforts to safeguard elections in the United States.
The DOJ filed lawsuits in September against six other states, California, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, New Hampshire, and Pennsylvania, over their refusal to provide their voter registration rolls.
“We know there are no proper safeguards to our elections,” state Republican California Assemblyman David Tangipa told the Washington Examiner.”
DOJ SUES SIX STATES FOR FAILURE TO PROVIDE VOTER DATA
“We have proof that inactive voters also voted in this last election, and this lack of transparency really hurts the people’s belief that we have safe elections,” Tangipa added. “We clearly have an issue, and the state fighting against the DOJ just creates more questions about what they are hiding.”
Prior to its September lawsuits, the administration also sued Maine and Oregon for failing to provide the voter list maintenance procedures they had established.