US Judge Blocks DOJ’s ‘Dragnet’ Probes of Voter Fraud Nationwide

A US judge blocked a key component of the Justice Department’s efforts under the Trump administration to obtain state voter records as part of a nationwide probe into alleged election fraud by non-US citizens.

In a 78-page opinion on Friday, a federal district judge in Washington delivered a strong rebuke of the department’s Civil Rights Division, which has led the push. US District Judge Sparkle Sooknanan wrote that officials “cannot evade” federal privacy laws “by attempting a dragnet investigation of the entire country.”

“DOJ cannot run roughshod over longstanding laws that were carefully crafted to protect the rights of the American people,” the judge said.

Sooknanan struck down the department’s “voter list maintenance policy.” She described that as a combination of requesting voter roll data from nearly every state, sharing those records with other federal agencies and contractors, checking voter lists against US immigration records and then demanding that states remove voters flagged as likely noncitizens.

The judge wrote that the department could continue to pursue more targeted investigations into whether state voter rolls are accurate and in compliance with federal laws, “including by acting on specific complaints.”

“The court vacates a policy that has removed United States citizens from the voter rolls in their home states and risks disenfranchising many more — a policy that flies in the face of duly enacted laws designed to protect Americans,” she wrote.

The case is Common Cause v. Department of Justice, 26-cv-1352, US District Court, District of Columbia.