Judge orders DOJ to stop threatening to prosecute election officials

A federal judge on Friday ordered the Justice Department to stop threatening state and local election officials with criminal prosecution over their handling of disputes about voter qualifications.

U.S. District Judge Trina Thompson also ordered the Trump administration to cease demanding that election workers remove voters from statewide rolls, refuse to issue ballots to specific voters or segregate ballots cast in the midterms based on the administration's claims that some voters are ineligible.

"Because the public has a paramount interest in ensuring that election officials and workers are able to carry out their work in accordance with federal law and election procedure, and the official day of the Elections is only a couple of days away, the balance of the equities and public interest weigh in Plaintiffs' favor," Thompson wrote.

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Thompson, a San Francisco-based Biden appointee, issued the temporary restraining order in connection with a lawsuit brought by the Service Employees International Union and other groups. Her directive also requires the DOJ to reach out to any state or local officials who received warnings about possible prosecution and inform them that "demands and threats of prosecution to election officials and workers … have been enjoined."

The Justice Department on Thursday sent letters to election workers in all 50 states alluding to possible prosecution if they didn't preserve election records. DOJ did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the judge's broad ruling.

Thompson's order effectively enforces a stern warning issued to the Trump administration by another California-based federal judge, David Carter, earlier this week. "These threats must stop," Carter wrote in a ruling that threw out the Justice Department's effort to compel California to set aside any ballots cast by up to 20,000 people federal officials had identified as likely noncitizens. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday declined to set aside Carter's order.

Thompson's new directive also follows an order by U.S. District Judge James Boasberg, chief of the federal district court in Washington, D.C., to require the Trump administration to provide the list of those 20,000 purported noncitizens to an immigrant advocacy group. Boasberg's order was rooted, in part, on the group's claim that the Trump administration's threats were influencing the conduct of state and local elected officials.

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