Advocacy Groups Blast Feds for Seeking 'Intrusive' Voter Registration Data
The DOJ “cannot defend its intrusive request” for states to turn over voter registration data to the federal government, so a case compelling California to do just that should be dropped, argued advocacy groups in court documents Monday.
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The federal government filed the case, U.S. v. Shirley Weber (No. 2:25-cv-09149), in September after California refused to turn over its voter registration data.
The U.S. government wants a “full, unredacted, statewide voter registration list,” said a joint document from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the NAACP California-Hawaii Conference, and the Services, Immigrant Rights and Education Network. The National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) doesn't provide the “DOJ with a record-inspection right greater than that held by the general public,” making it “legally insufficient to justify its demand for the entire statewide voter registration list.”
While the federal government may request certain voter information under the Civil Rights Act of 1960 (CRA), the data sought here is far more intrusive, the group said. “The CRA does not require States to turn over information in its possession that came from voters.”
Meanwhile, the League of Women Voters of California submitted a document Monday asking the U.S. District Court for Central California to dismiss the case.
The CRA, NVRA and the Help America Vote Act “do not blindly permit the United States Attorney General to embark on fishing expeditions into voting records or facilitate massive voter-data collection by the federal government,” the league said.
Also on Monday, a coalition of 16 Democratic attorneys general argued that no state should be forced to turn over this sensitive data to the federal government (see 2512010046).