Key facts
- A federal judge dismissed a Justice Department lawsuit against Maryland seeking detailed voter records.
- The Justice Department sought access to voter data including dates of birth, addresses, and partial Social Security numbers.
A federal judge has dismissed a Justice Department lawsuit against Maryland seeking detailed voter records, marking the ninth state where similar legal attempts have failed. The department sought access to data including dates of birth, addresses, and partial Social Security numbers.
The repeated legal setbacks for the Justice Department's efforts to obtain detailed voter data highlight ongoing tensions between federal oversight and state control over election records, raising questions about privacy and the scope of federal authority in election administration.
U.S. District Court Judge Stephanie Gallagher has dismissed a Justice Department lawsuit against Maryland that sought access to the state’s voter records. The ruling marks the ninth instance where a court has rejected the department's attempts to obtain detailed voter data, which includes dates of birth, addresses, driver’s license numbers, and partial Social Security numbers.
Gallagher, appointed by President Donald Trump, stated that the unredacted voter registration file is not a record that a state must produce to the United States under federal civil rights law. The Justice Department had cited an internal legal opinion to support its claim, but the judge was not persuaded.
Federal officials have argued that the voter data is necessary to ensure states are complying with federal election laws regarding voter registration lists. In a separate case concerning Rhode Island, a Justice Department attorney acknowledged the data was sought for the Department of Homeland Security's SAVE program to check citizenship status. However, a federal judge recently ruled that the SAVE program violated privacy laws and misidentified eligible voters as noncitizens.
Despite objections from some Democratic and Republican officials regarding privacy concerns, at least 13 states have either provided or agreed to provide their voter registration lists to the Justice Department. These states include Alaska, Arkansas, Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, and Wyoming.