The Justice Department’s ability to monitor local jurisdictions for voting rights irregularities on Election Day, already curtailed by the Supreme Court, is facing a new hurdle: opposition from Republicans who are seeking to block federal authorities from polling sites.
The U.S. government has regularly dispatched hundreds of monitors to voting locations in blue, red and swing states, aiming to protect ballot access, discourage improper partisan influence and act as a moderating force on political campaigns.
While the Justice Department has the legal right to request access to polling sites, inflamed partisanship and ideological extremism have contributed to greater resistance to such activitiesin some GOP-controlled states, legal experts said. Those states have attempted to politicize the process and cast federal monitors as partisans from the Biden administration who cannot be trusted.