Judge curbs Trump administration’s hunt for noncitizen voters in some states, citing flawed data

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A federal judge has ordered the Department of Homeland Security to stop certain investigative actions in its hunt for noncitizen voters, writing that the department’s efforts rely on faulty data that includes US citizens legally allowed to vote.

Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín wrote in the order that DHS’s data alleging hundreds of thousands of possible illegal voters “is widely known to inadvertently include U.S. citizens” and “leaves citizens afraid that their name will be wrongly included in the hundreds of thousands identified for investigation.”

The judge’s order specifically limits actions DHS takes in the field to investigate noncitizen voting, such as interviews, and says that DHS cannot take those actions if it believes the person they’re targeting could be a US citizen.

The order — which covers California, Connecticut, Georgia, Missouri, Nevada, New York, Pennsylvania, Washington and Wisconsin, however, does not take effect until Friday afternoon, giving the Trump administration time to appeal. Once it goes into effect, it is set to last until after the midterm elections.

DHS has been a driving force behind the administration’s efforts to bolster President Donald Trump’s unfounded claims of widespread voter fraud by noncitizens, aggressively expanding its efforts to investigate the issue. The new ruling, though limited in scope, marks a notable pushback to the agency’s approach.

CNN has reached out to DHS for comment.

“This order is a serious protection: the current policy targets known naturalized citizens,” Beau Tremitiere, an attorney for Protect Democracy, a legal organization that represents the groups that brought the case, told CNN. “Those operations are prohibited. And this order should otherwise force DHS to stop presuming many others are viable targets when there are indicia of citizenship.” Martínez-Olguín wrote in her order that “at issue here is the reliance on admittedly flawed and incomplete data to create a list of individuals for HSI to interview in the months leading up to an election.” The lawsuit against the government was brought by voting rights and advocacy groups who argued that DHS’s actions have already resulted in US citizens being afraid to vote in the upcoming midterm elections, as they may be included in the sweeping, faulty lists DHS has created. “The public’s interest in safe elections, free from interference or intimidation, far exceed Defendants’ purported interest in combating unlawful voting by non-U.S. citizens,” the judge wrote Wednesday.

Bill Pugliano/Getty Images/文件

一名联邦法官已下令国土安全部停止其在追查非公民选民过程中的某些调查行动，并指出该部门的行动依赖于错误的数据，其中包括合法拥有投票权的美国公民。

法官阿拉塞利·马丁内斯-奥尔金在命令中写道，国土安全部的数据声称有数十万名可能的非法选民，“众所周知，这些数据无意中包含了美国公民”，并且“让公民担心他们的名字会被错误地列入数十万个需要调查的名单中”。

法官的命令明确限制了国土安全部在实地调查非公民投票行为时采取的行动，例如面谈，并表示如果国土安全部认为其调查对象可能是美国公民，则不得采取这些行动。

这项涵盖加利福尼亚州、康涅狄格州、佐治亚州、密苏里州、内华达州、纽约州、宾夕法尼亚州、华盛顿州和威斯康星州的行政命令，要到周五下午才会生效，这给了特朗普政府时间提出上诉。一旦生效，该命令将持续到中期选举之后。

国土安全部一直是特朗普政府支持其毫无根据的“非公民普遍存在选民欺诈”指控的主要推动力量，并积极扩大了对该问题的调查力度。尽管这项新裁决的范围有限，但它标志着对该机构做法的一次显著反击。

CNN已联系国土安全部寻求置评。

“这项命令是一项重要的保护措施：现行政策针对的是已知的入籍公民，”代表提起诉讼的团体的法律组织“保护民主”（Protect Democracy）的律师博·特雷米蒂埃（Beau Tremitiere）告诉CNN。“这些行动是被禁止的。此外，这项命令应该会迫使国土安全部停止在发现公民身份迹象时，就假定其他人都是潜在的目标。” 马丁内斯-奥尔金法官在她的命令中写道：“问题的关键在于，国土安全部依赖公认存在缺陷且不完整的数据来创建一份名单，供国土安全调查局在选举前几个月进行面谈。” 这项针对政府的诉讼是由投票权和倡导团体提起的，他们认为国土安全部的行为已经导致美国公民害怕在即将到来的中期选举中投票，因为他们可能会被列入国土安全部创建的这份范围广泛但存在缺陷的名单中。法官周三写道：“公众对安全选举、免受干扰或恐吓的利益远远超过被告声称的打击非美国公民非法投票的利益。”