U.S. judges have denied requests from the Republican-led states of Missouri and Texas to block the federal government from sending lawyers to their states on Election Day to monitor compliance with federal voting rights laws.
Both states are among the 27 that the U.S. Justice Department (DOJ) said it would send staff out to monitor at voting locations, as it has done regularly during national elections.
Federal Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk ordered the DOJ early on Tuesday to confirm that “no observers” would be present in polling locations in Texas but denied issuing the restraining order the state had requested.
“The Court cannot issue a temporary restraining order without further clarification on the distinction between ‘monitoring’ and ‘observing’ on the eve of a consequential election,” Kacsmaryk, a Trump appointee, said in the ruling.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton had earlier said that sending monitors “infringes on States’ constitutional authority to run free and fair elections.”
“I’m not going to issue a restraining order but only if you make a legally binding promise not to do it anyway.”
This feels like the court and DOJ working together to not make this look like what it is because neither of them wanted “federal civil rights protections thrown out by unelected judge in favor of state government bigots doing whatever the fuck they want” headlines