A coalition of civil rights groups and labor unions sued the Trump administration Friday seeking to block the potential deployment of armed federal agents at or near polling places during the midterm elections.
Filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, the lawsuit argues that deploying armed federal agents in ways that would intimidate voters is a direct violation of the Voting Rights Act. The lawsuit’s plaintiffs include the NAACP and eight other civil rights groups representing Latino, Asian and Black coalitions.
This is the second lawsuit filed in two weeks challenging the Trump administration over the potential deployment of federal agents, including Immigrations and Customs Enforcement officers at polling places during November’s midterms.
The Trump administration’s “threatening messaging and violent enforcement actions have created a climate in which voters, especially voters of color, are intimidated and fearful of engaging
in the democratic process,” the plaintiffs wrote in the lawsuit. The plaintiffs also noted that members of their organizations “credibly fear that their participation in this November’s midterm elections will subject them to physical force and increased surveillance by the federal government.”
President Donald Trump has pushed to restrict voting ahead of the midterms and has repeatedly raised doubts about the integrity of U.S. elections, in part by insisting without evidence that noncitizen voting is widespread despite research showing it is extremely rare. As voters cast ballots in the primary elections earlier this year, the Justice Department deployed dozens of election monitors to polling locations across the country during primary elections. Officials have also vowed to send up to 1,000 more to monitor polling sites during the November elections.
The plaintiffs argued that the Trump administration’s actions surrounding the election, coupled with the deadly immigration enforcement operation in Minneapolis earlier this year that resulted in the deaths of Renée Good and Alex Pretti, have sown “credible” fear in the electorate that amounts to voter intimidation.
“The Administration sought to capitalize on that terror, conditioning the withdrawal of its unprecedented federal deployment in Minnesota on the State’s surrendering private voter roll data,” the lawsuit said, referring to a letter then-Attorney General Pam Bondi sent to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz after federal immigration officers fatally shot Good and Pretti in January. Bondi demanded access to Minnesota’s voter rolls in the letter.
The Trump administration’s “conduct has transformed voting and voting-related activities — ordinary acts of civic participation — into sources of anxiety, uncertainty, and fear,” the lawsuit said.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement to MS NOW that ICE was “not planning operations targeting polling locations.”
“ICE conducts intelligence-driven targeted enforcement, and if an active public safety threat endangered a polling location, they may be arrested as a result of that targeted enforcement action,” the spokesperson added.
However, DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin has repeatedly said that ICE officers may be deployed to polling places during the midterm elections for “specific threats.” During a Sept. 1 news conference, Mullin told reporters that agents may be deployed “if there is a threat to that polling place or we’re serving a warrant on someone that we have been actively tracking down.”
Latino civil rights groups UnidosUS and the League of United Latin American Citizens, or LULAC, along with voting rights organization Common Cause, argued in a lawsuit filed last week that deploying armed federal agents at polls would violate a separate federal law meant to safeguard free and fair elections. That lawsuit argued that such a deployment would disrupt voting and interfere with local election officials’ ability to administer elections smoothly and safely.
The NAACP filed its lawsuit as early voting began in several states Friday, with just six weeks left until voters decide which party will control Congress in November.
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