Federal judge tosses out DOJ lawsuit seeking Minnesota voter data

A federal judge on Monday, Aug. 17, dismissed a Trump administration lawsuit seeking Minnesota voter rolls. The Department of Justice is now 0-23 in its effort to obtain voter information maintained by the states.

The U.S. Department of Justice sued Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon in September over his refusal to hand over Minnesota’s voter registration list, which includes voters’ names, birthdates, addresses and partial Social Security numbers.

“Normally, when the Department of Justice under either or both political parties asks states for elections-related information, it’s very specific,” Simon told the Reformer in September. “Now we’re seeing huge and sweeping data requests for millions of Minnesotans and tens of millions of Americans in the eight affected states that we have never seen before, for purposes that are murky at best and that have caused a lot of suspicion and alarm across the country.”

President Donald Trump and his allies have falsely alleged widespread voter fraud dating back to Trump’s loss to former president Joe Biden in 2020.

“The government suggests it is permitted to use a civil action as a ‘fishing expedition,’” U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez wrote in her order dismissing the case. “But an ordinary litigant isn’t allowed to seek discovery first and allege a claim later, and the federal government has no special privilege to do so either.”

Voter fraud is extremely rare. ProPublica reported on Friday that the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Minnesota subpoenaed 130 people as part of the Justice Department’s high-priority criminal investigation into illegal voting; only one has been referred for prosecution.

The DOJ has shared voter information with the Department of Homeland Security, which sent agents to states, including Minnesota, to pursue voter fraud cases. Those agents demonstrated “a complete lack of understanding” of illegal voting investigations, assistant U.S. Attorney Joe Teirab — a former Republican candidate for Congress — wrote in an email obtained by ProPublica.

Federal judges in the following states have already tossed out similar cases: Michigan, Oregon, California, Maryland, Colorado, Wisconsin, Maine, Arizona, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Mexico, Illinois, New Jersey, Kentucky, Virginia, New York, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, the District of Columbia, and Nevada.

Minnesota Reformer is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Minnesota Reformer maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor J. Patrick Coolican for questions: info@minnesotareformer.com.