By Jan Wolfe
WASHINGTON, May 14 (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump’s executive order tightening rules on mail-in voting faced its first major court test on Thursday when a federal judge heard arguments by Democratic Party lawyers that it would disenfranchise millions of eligible voters.
During a two-hour court hearing in Washington, U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols did not rule from the bench on the request by Democratic Party leaders that he block the March 31 executive order. He said he would issue a written decision at a later date, adding he was “aware of time pressure here.”
Trump, a Republican, has for years pushed the false claim that his 2020 election defeat was the result of widespread voter fraud and has called for tighter rules on voting by mail ahead of the November midterm elections, when his party will be trying to defend its narrow majorities in Congress.
His executive order directs his administration to compile a list of confirmed U.S. citizens eligible to vote in each state and to use federal data to help state election officials verify who is eligible to vote.
It also requires the U.S. Postal Service to only deliver ballots to voters on each state’s approved mail-in ballot list. States must also preserve election-related records for five years.
Plaintiffs in the litigation include Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York and the Democratic National Committee.
“This case is pretty straightforward on the merits,” Lali Madduri, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, told Nichols. “There is no statute that authorizes the commands in the executive order that we are challenging.”
The Justice Department has argued that the litigation is premature because federal agencies have not yet implemented the executive order.
Nichols at times appeared sympathetic to that argument, saying it was not clear at this early stage of the litigation that the plaintiffs would be “irreparably harmed” by the federal government compiling data it already has in its possession on eligible voters.
“We have to hypothesize not just that some states will use the list but… also that the list is used in a way that harms some of that state’s voters,” Nichols said.
A similar lawsuit brought by a coalition of Democratic state attorneys is pending before a federal judge in Boston.
(Reporting by Jan Wolfe; Editing by Andrea Ricci and Bill Berkrot)
