Justice Department sues five states for access to voter rolls, including four red ones

The Justice Department sued five more states Thursday for access to its voter rolls after they failed to turn them over, including four states that are largely conservative and voted for President Donald Trump.

The latest batch of lawsuits targeted secretaries of state in Kentucky, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Utah and West Virginia.

The move comes as the DOJ pushes states to clean up their voter rolls ahead of the November midterms by removing inactive, non-citizen or duplicate records from their systems, and sued states that failed to turn over their respective rolls. 

The DOJ has largely targeted blue states such as California, Oregon and Maryland, but Kentucky, Oklahoma, Utah and West Virginia are all predominantly Republican and the states voted for Trump in 2020 and 2024, Politico reported.

“We will not be deterred, regardless of party affiliation, from carrying out critical election integrity legal duties,” Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon said in a statement.

Dhillon also said Thursday that the DOJ has appealed decisions related to voter rolls in California, Michigan and Oregon.

The department has argued that it has the authority to review state voter rolls through the National Voter Registration Act, the Help America Vote Act, and the Civil Rights Act of 1960.