Democratic attorneys general sue Trump over ‘illegal’ voting order

A coalition of 19 Democratic attorneys general filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration on Thursday, arguing that a recent executive order signed by the president that seeks to overhaul the nation’s elections was “unconstitutional, anti-democratic, and un-American”.

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The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Massachusetts, challenges several provisions of the far-reaching executive order issued last week, including the proof-of-citizenship requirements for voter registration and new rules requiring all mail ballots be received by election day.

The attorneys general accuse the president of overstepping his authority and allege that the order “usurps the states’ constitutional power and seeks to amend election law by fiat”.

Among the defendants named in the lawsuit are Trump, the attorney general Pam Bondi and the United States Election Assistance Commission, an independent agency charged with helping to improve election administration and ensuring voting accessibility and security.

The state attorneys general say they are asking a judge to declare the provisions “unconstitutional and void”.

“The president’s executive order has no legal justification and far exceeds the scope of his constitutional authority,” the California attorney general Rob Bonta, a Democrat, said during a press conference on Thursday afternoon.

“Let me be clear: Trump is acting like he’s above the law. He isn’t. He’s violating the US constitution. He can’t, which is why we’re taking action.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In the lawsuit, the attorneys general repeatedly cite the elections clause of the constitution, which says that states set the “times, places and manner” of elections. The clause allows Congress to pass federal voting laws, which House Republicans are racing to do, but “nowhere does the constitution provide the president, or the executive branch, with any independent power to modify the states’ procedures for conducting federal elections”, the attorneys general assert in the complaint.

California was joined by the Democratic attorneys general of Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin.

Aaron Ford, the Democratic attorney general of Nevada, said Trump’s executive order was not only unconstitutional but “unnecessary”. He said that all US states had a “vested interest” in ensuring a fair election process.

“To insinuate otherwise and to seek to impose restrictions based on these insinuations, is political gamesmanship. Frankly, it’s illegal political gamesmanship,” Ford said during the press conference with Bonta.

“Blackmailing states with the removal of election security funding unless we comply with the order is a far more damaging and harmful threat than any perceived dangers the president is peddling falsehoods over.”

Trump’s elections order, described by White House staff secretary Will Scharf as “the farthest-reaching executive action taken” in the nation’s history, also faces legal challenges brought by the Democratic National Committee, the Democratic Governors Association, and Senate and House Democratic leaders, as well as a separate lawsuit filed by two nonprofit organizations, the Campaign Legal Center and the State Democracy Defenders Fund.

These lawsuits were filed in the US district court for the District of Columbia.

Trump, a prolific spreader of election falsehoods who sought to overturn his 2020 defeat on the baseless claim of a stolen election, has said the order is necessary to protect US elections against illegal non-citizen voting. Instances of noncitizens casting ballots in federal elections – a felony crime – are exceedingly rare. Yet Trump and Republicans have continued to amplify the myth.

Trump’s order stated that the US had failed “to enforce basic and necessary election protection”, despite reports by elections officials that the recent elections have been among the most secure in US history.

“The president seemingly had no qualms with the result of the last election and happily took office for a second term,” Bonta said. “That’s because our elections are secure.”