Photo: Pelajanela, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. File photo of the Justice Department headquarters, not the court filing.
The US Justice Department has told a federal court that no FBI or Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) employees will serve as monitors during next week's midterm elections, a concession that follows a lawsuit by the NAACP arguing that deploying federal law enforcement to polling places would intimidate voters.
In a court filing late on Wednesday, the department said election monitors will observe polling places and take notes, will not act as law enforcement personnel, will be prohibited from carrying firearms, and have been trained not to interfere with voting and to follow state and local rules, Reuters reported.
The filing, a declaration by Eric Neff, a top official in the Justice Department's voting section, was made in the US District Court for the District of Columbia in a case brought by the NAACP, Bloomberg Law reported.
Who will — and won't — be at the polls
While employees of the Federal Bureau of Prisons, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) will serve as monitors, the department said no FBI or ICE employees will be deployed in that role.
Neff said the department's Civil Rights Division "is not engaging any sworn law enforcement personnel who are legally authorized to effectuate an arrest to act as monitors in a 'law enforcement agent' capacity." Although one Customs and Border Protection employee is detailed to the Justice Department, Neff said the agency "is not aware of any other" employees from the Department of Homeland Security participating in its monitoring of the November 3 election.
Neff added that the voting section is conducting election monitoring "in a similar manner and for similar purposes as in past election cycles going back decades."
Why the NAACP sued
The NAACP sued to bar prosecutors and other law enforcement personnel from serving as monitors, arguing that the Trump administration's plans amount to voter intimidation. Voting rights advocates and Democratic Party leaders have argued in lawsuits that the administration is planning to unlawfully send immigration enforcement agents and other federal law enforcement to polling sites on Election Day, pointing to statements by top immigration and law enforcement officials.
Civil rights groups have said the prospect of such a deployment could intimidate voters, particularly Black, Latino and Asian communities, naturalized citizens and members of mixed-status families. The NAACP also filed a Freedom of Information Act suit earlier this month seeking a list of all jurisdictions where monitors will be deployed for the election and other records tied to the alleged presence of federal law enforcement at polling places.
The wider election-oversight fight
The filing lands in the middle of the administration's increasingly aggressive approach to election oversight. The Justice Department has pressed states for voter-registration data, issued more than 100 subpoenas seeking voter records in at least 13 states, and argued that stricter measures are needed to ensure public confidence in the vote. Some officials told Reuters this month that they are preparing for potential federal interference in the midterm elections.
Separately this week, a federal judge rejected the department's bid to block California from counting mail ballots from more than 20,000 voters it alleged were likely noncitizens — a ruling the department is appealing. The poll-monitoring filing does not end the broader legal fight over federal election oversight, but it does draw a line the administration had previously left open: on Election Day itself, the FBI and ICE will not be watching the polls.
With voting already under way and control of Congress at stake on November 3, the question now is whether the assurance calms the intimidation fears that prompted the lawsuit — or whether the presence of other federal personnel at polling places keeps them alive.
Sources: Reuters; Bloomberg Law; The Times of India.