Civil rights groups sue to keep armed agents away from voting sites
The suit argues the administration has created a climate in which “voters, especially voters of color, are intimidated and fearful of engaging in the democratic process.”
WASHINGTON — Civil rights groups and labor unions sued the Trump administration Friday, asserting that its aggressive immigration enforcement and suggestions that it could send armed agents to polling sites amounted to voter intimidation and violated the Voting Rights Act.
Brought by a coalition of Black, Asian, and Latino civil rights groups and unions, including the NAACP and the Service Employees International Union, the lawsuit seeks to block any effort by the Trump administration to deploy federal agents at voting locations, which the groups contend can deter citizens trying to legally vote.
The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, argues that President Donald Trump, Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin, and other members of the administration had created a climate in which “voters, especially voters of color, are intimidated and fearful of engaging in the democratic process.”
They had done so, the suit says, by simultaneously pushing false narratives of rampant voting by noncitizens, conducting sweeping immigration enforcement in communities of color, and repeatedly suggesting that they could send armed agents to polls.
The White House and the Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to requests for comment sent Friday morning. But in the past, Mullin has said that opponents were fearmongering and that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement was not patrolling polling places. “The only reason why we would be at polling places is if there is a threat to that polling place,” he said, “or we’re serving a warrant.”
The lawsuit points specifically to the Trump administration’s recently expanded efforts to identify noncitizens registered to vote, despite no evidence of rampant voter fraud by noncitizens.
Taken together, the lawsuit argues, the actions and statements constituted a violation of Section 11(b) of the Voting Rights Act, which broadly prohibits actual or attempted intimidation, threats, and coercion directed at voters and anyone helping to facilitate voting. This section of the Voting Rights Act was not affected by a recent Supreme Court decision weakening the landmark civil rights legislation.
The act, the lawsuit says, broadly protects against voter intimidation, and requires only that voters reasonably fear being subject to harassment or violence for casting a ballot. “The breadth of Congress’s words was by design,” the lawsuit says.
This is at least the second lawsuit seeking to block the Trump administration from deploying armed federal agents near polling stations. Last week, the city of Denver, Latino civil rights organizations, and government watchdog groups argued in a lawsuit that allowing immigration agents at voting locations violates a separate federal law protecting free and fair elections.
For months, Democrats have voiced concerns that Trump is seeking to assert greater control over the coming elections and sow doubt about the outcome. While Trump administration officials have said there is currently no plan to deploy armed agents to polling sites, they have also not ruled out the possibility of doing so.
This article originally appeared in the New York Times.
