Federal judge bars Trump administration from threatening election officials over ballots before Tuesday's midterms
US District Judge Trina Thompson issued an order on Friday night barring the Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security from threatening or coercing state and local election officials to stop processing ballots of voters the administration alleges are ineligible. The order runs until 16 November.
A federal judge in California issued an order on Friday night (Saturday 31 October GMT) barring the Trump administration from threatening or intimidating state and local election officials ahead of Tuesday’s midterm elections, NBC News reported.
The eight-page order by US District Judge Trina Thompson prohibits any action that may “threaten, intimidate or coerce state or local elections officials or workers to demand that they halt processing the ballots of any registered voter solely on the basis that the ballot belongs to an individual alleged by [the administration] to be ineligible to vote.” It runs until 16 November.
“In the lead-up to the election, high-ranking DOJ and DHS officials have engaged in a campaign to intimidate, threaten, and coerce state and local officials and employees who are engaged in administering the ongoing midterm 2026 election,” Thompson wrote. She said that although the administration says its actions are meant to stop unlawful voting by noncitizens, they “are likely to have the effect of interfering with election administration and disenfranchising lawful voters.”
The Justice Department sent letters last week to election officials in 57 of California’s 58 counties, NBC News reported. One, sent to San Bernardino County on 22 October by First Assistant US Attorney Bilal Essayli, attached a list of “1133 likely aliens” and asked officials to “segregate—not cancel” the mail ballots of anyone whose citizenship could not be confirmed, warning that “the legal consequences for either facilitating or ignoring federal crimes are significant.”
On Friday a federal appeals court also rejected the administration’s request to force California officials to segregate those ballots, NBC News reported. A similar case in Washington state is pending.
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