The Justice Department is compiling the largest set of national voter roll data it has ever collected, buttressing an effort by President Trump and his supporters to try to prove long-running, unsubstantiated claims that droves of undocumented immigrants have voted illegally, according to people familiar with the matter.
The effort to essentially establish a national voting database, involving more than 30 states, has elicited serious concerns among voting rights experts because it is led by allies of the president, who as recently as this January refused to acknowledge Joseph R. Biden Jr. fairly won the 2020 election. It has also raised worries that those same officials could use the data to revive lies of a stolen election, or try to discredit future election results.
The initiative has proceeded along two tracks, one at the Justice Department’s civil rights division and another at its criminal division, seeking data about individual voters across the country, including names and addresses, in a move that experts say may violate the law. It is a significant break from decades of practice by Republican and Democratic administrations, which believed that doing so was federal overreach and ripe for abuse.
“Nobody has ever done anything like this,” said Justin Levitt, an election law expert at Loyola Marymount University’s law school and a former Justice Department official.
The Justice Department has requested data from at least 16 Republican-controlled states, including Mississippi, Alabama and Texas. It has also sent more formal demands for data to at least 17 mostly Democrat-controlled or swing states, including Pennsylvania, Nevada, Wisconsin and New York.
Nearly every state has resisted turning over voter files with private, personally identifiable information on voters like driver’s license numbers or Social Security numbers. Last week, a local judge blocked South Carolina from releasing private voter information to the Justice Department.
In a private meeting with the staff of top state election officials last month, Michael Gates, a deputy assistant attorney general in the civil rights division, disclosed that all 50 states would eventually receive similar requests, according to notes of the meeting reviewed by The New York Times. In particular, he said, the federal government wants the last four digits of every voter’s Social Security number….
Mr. Levitt likened the effort to sending federal troops to bolster local police work. “It’s wading in, without authorization and against the law, with an overly heavy federal hand to take over a function that states are actually doing just fine,” he said, adding that “it’s wildly illegal, deeply troubling, and nobody asked for this.”
In a statement, a Justice Department spokesman, Gates McGavick, said, “Enforcing the nation’s elections laws is a priority in this administration and in the civil rights division.”…
“Democrats pick members for new GOP-led committee on Jan. 6 Capitol attack”
WaPo:
Democrats named the members of their caucus to serve on a new subcommittee reinvestigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol — a Republican-led probe that threatens to reignite tensions over one of the most divisive events in American political history.
Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-New York) announced Monday that Reps. Eric Swalwell (D-California), Jared Moskowitz (D-Florida) and Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) will participate in the eight-member committee and Jamie Raskin (D-Maryland) will serve as an ex officio member….
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) is tasked with choosing the Republican members who will serve on the subcommittee, but has yet to announce who will represent the GOP on the panel. Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Georgia), who spearheaded a report as a subcommittee chair under the House Administration Committee last Congress is expected to lead the new subcommittee.
The new subcommittee will have subpoena power and is “authorized and directed to conduct a full and complete investigation” of the events on Jan. 6, when a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol to prevent the certification of Biden’s election.
It is intended to be a response to the 117th Congress’s original Jan. 6 select committee, which held high-profile public hearings and released an 845-page report after 18 months of work including reviewing emails, text messages, call logs and White House records, and conducting more than 1,000 interviews….
Season 2 of “Law and Democracy” podcast
It starts with an episode, “What America Can Learn from Australia” available on YouTube and Apple Podcasts, in which I discuss with the Election Law at Ohio State team my reflections from spending a month this summer on a fellowship at the University of Melbourne. The main one concerns Australia’s compulsory voting and the effect it has on attitudes towards democratic participation. But there are many other takeaways as well. It was a very fun conversation and hopefully beneficial to listeners.
“White House may discuss mid-decade redistricting with Nebraska lawmakers this week”
A handful of Nebraska lawmakers are set to travel to Washington, D.C., this week for a “state leadership conference” at the White House’s invitation.
But, if what happened with delegations from other states is an indication, another reason for the trip might be for President Donald Trump and his team to lay groundwork for asking another red state to redistrict congressional boundaries to Republican advantage before the 2026 election.
At least four Nebraska lawmakers confirmed with the Examiner that they are headed to Capitol Hill on Tuesday. The official reason is the leadership conference organized by the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs….
“Missouri House Set to Vote on Map That Boosts Republicans”
The Missouri House of Representatives is poised to vote on Tuesday on new congressional boundaries that would create an additional Republican-leaning district, part of President Trump’s national push to redraw maps to favor his party ahead of the midterm elections.
As lawmakers gathered at the Missouri State Capitol this week, Democrats, who are outnumbered, decried the new boundaries as “brazen,” “shameless,” cheating or “all to protect Trump,” and questioned whether drawing a new map now was even legal. States generally pass new congressional boundaries once a decade, after the results of the census are published.
“If we sanction this midcycle redraw, we will be joining the long and shameful line of the states that have used legal language to silence voters rather than to protect them,” said State Representative Kem Smith, a Democrat from the St. Louis area.
But Republicans used their large majority on Monday to advance the new map, which would split a Kansas City-based district now held by Representative Emanuel Cleaver, a Democrat who has held a congressional seat for two decades. The proposed boundaries would favor Republicans in seven of Missouri’s eight districts, up from the six seats they currently hold. The new boundaries would splice Kansas City’s core into districts with large rural areas….
“Thune Moves to Speed Trump Nominees Past Democratic Blockade”
NYT:
Republicans took the first step on Monday toward changing the Senate’s rules to speed the confirmations of Trump administration nominees being slowed by Democratic opposition, touching off the latest in a yearslong tit for tat between the two parties that has weakened the filibuster.
The move is a response to Democrats’ refusal to allow President Trump’s nominees to be considered, which has slowed their confirmations and frustrated the president. But its consequences will reach beyond Mr. Trump’s tenure, effectively whittling down the ability of the minority to register any opposition to executive branch nominees below the cabinet level.
Senator John Thune of South Dakota, the majority leader, made the first move on Monday by introducing a resolution that would group 48 of Mr. Trump’s nominees together to allow them to be considered and voted on as a group. That will queue up a complex series of floor votes this week and next that, if successful, would create new Senate precedents meant to help Republicans clear a growing backlog of nominees.
Republicans, who hold 53 seats, will try to muscle through the rules change using a simple majority, a tactic known as “going nuclear,” in part because of the charged partisan cloud it can leave over an institution that once prided itself on operating according to consensus.
t is the latest change to chip away at longstanding Senate precedent in the face of an increasingly polarized political environment.
Speaking on the Senate floor, Mr. Thune framed the rules change as a necessary response to what he framed as an unprecedented Democratic blockade against fast confirmation of any of Mr. Trump’s nominees, including lower-level picks that have traditionally been confirmed by voice votes or by unanimous consent.
Democrats, staunchly opposed to Mr. Trump’s efforts to reshape the executive branch and insisting more attention be paid to nominees they say are unqualified, have insisted on formal votes for each person, delaying approval of the president’s picks for dozens of jobs….
Changes to the Senate’s precedents, which govern how the chamber works, are supposed to require the approval of 67 senators, a barrier meant to make them more difficult to adopt. In using what is known as the nuclear option, members of the majority party instead attempt to take an action that has never been allowed before and then hold a number of procedural votes to overrule any objection by the minority and proceed, thus setting a new precedent that replaces what has been done in the past.
Democrats used the tactic in 2013 to lower the vote threshold on most nominees to a simple majority rather than 60 votes, a response to Senate Republicans systematically blocking a series of Obama administration judicial appointees.
Republicans then retaliated in 2017 to lower the threshold for Supreme Court nominees, allowing Mr. Trump to install three justices during his first term….
Register for Free Sept. 16 Webinar from Safeguarding Democracy Project: “The Risk of Federal Interference in the 2026 Midterm Elections”
The Risk of Federal Interference in the 2026 Midterm Elections
Tuesday, September 16, 12:15pm-1:15pm PT, Webinar
Register here.
Ben Haiman, UVA Center for Public Safety and Justice, Liz Howard, NYU Law Brennan Center for Justice, and Stephen Richer, Ash Center for Democratic Governance… Continue reading
“Russia Steps Up Disinformation Efforts as Trump Abandons Resistance”
NYT:
Since returning to the White House in January, President Trump has dismantled the American government’s efforts to combat foreign disinformation. The problem is that Russia has not stopped spreading it.
How much that matters can now be seen in… Continue reading
“Republicans brace for redistricting ‘catastrophe’ in California”
Politico:
Republicans wield almost no power in California. But as a moribund state party gathered here over the weekend, it confronted an even grimmer reality now suddenly settling in: If the state gerrymanders its congressional map, they’ll practically be… Continue reading
“How Does the Gerrymandering Arms Race End?”
Alex Keena, Michael Latner, and Natasha Romero Moskala write at the Substack of the Houston Institute for Race & Justice.
Should Representative Ronny Jackson’s Lawyers Be Sanctioned for Filing a Frivolous Federal Lawsuit Attacking California’s Proposed Ballot Measure Redrawing Congressional Districts?
This ridiculous complaint went nowhere even before federal district judge Matthew Kascmaryk given that Rep. Jackson could not prove irreparable harm before the ballot measure even passes and given that Jackson failed to give notice to the other side. Here’s… Continue reading
“The Secret Bundlers Behind Eric Adams’ Campaign Fundraising Revealed”
The City:
In October 2023, Mayor Eric Adams showed up for the opening of a new office of a big personal injury law firm, Morgan & Morgan, smiling and posing for selfies in Manhattan’s South Street Seaport. The firm made… Continue reading
“U.S. Is Increasingly Exposed to Chinese Election Threats, Lawmakers Say”
NYT:
Democratic lawmakers warned on Friday that severe staff cuts at an intelligence office that monitors foreign threats to U.S. elections would leave the country vulnerable to interference and subversion from Beijing, as Chinese companies use artificial intelligence as a… Continue reading
“10 Alaskans born in American Samoa plead not guilty in voting case highlighting citizenship issues”
AP:
Ten Alaska residents pleaded not guilty Thursday to voter misconduct or other charges in cases that have renewed attention on the complex citizenship status of people born in the U.S. territory of American Samoa.
Those facing charges —… Continue reading