Pennsylvania Department of State refuses to turn over full voter registration data to Trump administration
Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al Schmidt called the federal inquiry a "concerning attempt to expand the federal government's role in our country's electoral process."
The Pennsylvania Department of State will not turn over its voter registration database to the Trump administration, denying a request that has been sent to dozens of other states in an apparent inquiry into state voter roll maintenance.
In recent months the Department of Justice has sought unredacted voter rolls from at least 15 states, according to the Associated Press. None of the states has fully complied with the requests, as legal experts argue doing so would violate state and federal law. The inquiries appear to target mostly blue and swing states.
“This request, and reported efforts to collect broad data on millions of Americans, represent a concerning attempt to expand the federal government’s role in our country’s electoral process,” Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al Schmidt said Thursday in his response to the DOJ.
He assured federal officials that his department takes its responsibility for voter roll maintenance and election security seriously, telling DOJ officials that “because your letters do not provide any legal justification for the Department to disregard this sacred obligation, we are unable to share such confidential information with you.”
Last week, after several states sent redacted versions of their voter rolls, the DOJ followed up with letters demanding the unredacted dataset, which would include detailed personal identifying information about voters that is traditionally considered sealed. In its letter to Pennsylvania, the agency granted the state a three-day extension to respond to the data request.
Schmidt offered the DOJ a copy of Pennsylvania’s redacted public voter file but said there was no precedent to justify the state turning over the sensitive information contained in the full dataset. In fact, he argued, state law barred him from releasing that information.
Voting rights advocates and legal experts have decried the DOJ inquiries as illegal and an effort to sow doubt in election security ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. The inquiry has coincided with continued efforts by President Donald Trump to influence the midterms, including a push for mid-cycle redistricting in Republican-leaning states and a recent announcement that he would seek to ban mail voting.
While voter rolls are public record, Pennsylvania law requires that officials strip personal identifying information, such as driver’s license numbers and Social Security numbers, when responding to public records requests. The Trump administration sought the full, unredacted document, along with details on any voters who had been removed from the rolls because of a felony conviction, lack of citizenship, or incompetency.
Earlier this month, the ACLU of Pennsylvania threatened legal action if the state sought to provide that personal information to the federal government.
The Department of Justice did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Pennsylvania’s response. An agency spokesperson previously said that the DOJ “has a statutory mandate to enforce federal voting rights laws” but did not indicate there was a specific issue being investigated in Pennsylvania.
In a letter Monday, Schmidt responded to other questions in the DOJ’s request, explaining the state’s procedures for removing voters from rolls and responding to detailed questions from the DOJ about federal election data. The Department of Justice, Pennsylvania argued, had misinterpreted data and inaccurately sought to compare Pennsylvania’s response to other states.
Among the errors flagged in the Monday letter, Schmidt noted that the Department of Justice incorrectly asked about Pennsylvania’s 66 counties. The state has 67 counties.