The Department of Justice filed federal lawsuits on Thursday against five states for failing to answer a request for complete voter registration lists. These states are: Kentucky, Oklahoma, New Jersey, Utah, and West Virginia.
Each state was sent a request to provide such lists to the DOJ for election security verification purposes.
The Department of Justice announced the lawsuits in a press release issued on Thursday. Attorney General Pam Bondi commented on the lawsuits, emphasizing that accurate voter rolls are an integral part of election security.
“Accurate, well-maintained voter rolls are a requisite for the election integrity that the American people deserve,” Bondi said. “This latest series of litigation underscores that this Department of Justice is fulfilling its duty to ensure transparency, voter roll maintenance, and secure elections across the country.”
Thursday’s lawsuit brings the total number of states being sued by the Justice Department over failures to respond to voter registration list requests to 29, according to the release.
Assistant Attorney General of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division Harmeet K. Dhillon expressed the DOJ’s commitment to ensuring accurate voter registration lists. She described such efforts as an essential oversight role of the DOJ.
“The Justice Department will continue to fulfill its oversight role dutifully, neutrally, and transparently wherever Americans vote in federal elections,” Dhillon said. “Many state election officials, however, are choosing to fight us in court rather than show their work. We will not be deterred, regardless of party affiliation, from carrying out critical election integrity legal duties.”
Previous lawsuits have claimed that the attorney general is “uniquely charged by Congress with broad authority to request election records under the Civil Rights Act of 1960.” This would allegedly include states complying with Department of Justice requests to provide voter registration lists.
DOJ SUES UCLA OVER ALLEGED ANTISEMITISM AND ‘HOSTILE WORK ENVIRONMENT’
Furthermore, the DOJ asserted that the Civil Rights Act of 1960 grants Bondi the authority to request states to send voter registration lists for “inspection and analysis” to ensure accuracy of “statewide voter registration lists that can be cross-checked effectively for improper registrations.”
President Donald Trump made election security an integral part of his 2024 presidential campaign platform. As a candidate, he said he would “secure” U.S. elections and that Republicans would “ensure election integrity.”
In March 2025, Trump issued an executive order, “Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections.” The directive stipulated that the attorney general restrict non-citizens from registering to vote or voting, including through the use of “state-issued identification records,” and to coordinate with states in aiding with “state-level review and prosecution of aliens unlawfully registered to vote or casting votes.”
