DOJ says it is near recruiting 1,000 election monitors for the midterms
Harmeet Dhillon claims the Justice Department is close to fielding history's largest election-monitoring force, though her own description of their authority is inaccurate.
What to know
- Dhillon says the DOJ is nearly done recruiting 1,000 federal election monitors for the midterms, calling it the largest such effort in history.
- Dhillon repeatedly called the monitors 'observers,' but legally, monitors have far less authority than statutory federal observers, who can currently be sent to only three jurisdictions nationwide.
- Past DOJ election monitors identified by Democracy Docket include lawyers with controversial backgrounds, raising questions about vetting.
- The claim comes as the DOJ has lost 25 straight district court rulings in its separate push to obtain unredacted voter registration data from states.
“Federal election monitors from the department are — observers, I should say — are similar to other types of observers you see, so they're not going to be interfering in any way or running the election. They are going to be observing”
Harmeet Dhillon, Assistant Attorney General, DOJ Civil Rights Division · Real America's Voice interview, via Democracy Docket ↗ · Sep 20
Harmeet Dhillon Assistant Attorney General, DOJ Civil Rights Division
Donald Trump U.S. PresidentWilliam Mohrman DOJ Voting Section lawyer / election monitorDavid Michael Levin DOJ election monitor
How it unfolded 1 development · click the chart to see its coverage articlesposts
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Democracy Docket reports Dhillon's claim and disputes her terminology
Democracy Docket published and circulated a report on Dhillon's remarks, clarifying that the DOJ can currently send statutory federal observers to only three jurisdictions (Union County, NJ; Pawtucket, RI; St. Landry Parish, LA) and that the 1,000 monitors have far more limited authority than Dhillon described.
“I've called for, and plan to send, 1,000 to the general election jurisdictions that we're selecting. And I'm really excited to say that we have — we're pretty close to that number of people who've raised their hands…”
— Harmeet Dhillon, Assistant Attorney General, DOJ Civil Rights Division · source -
first by Democracy Docket, 1d ago
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NEW: Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon claimed the DOJ is close to fully enlisting 1,000 federal election monitors to observe the midterms in what she said would be history's "biggest election DOJ observer effort."
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background
Dhillon tells Real America's Voice DOJ is near 1,000 monitors — In an interview with the far-right outlet Real America's Voice, Dhillon said the department is close to fully staffing its planned 1,000 election monitors from department lawyers and other trained legal staff, and repeatedly called them 'observers' despite the legal distinction between monitors and statutory election observers.
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background
DOJ suffers 25th straight court loss on voter data demands — A federal judge in Washington rejected the DOJ's legal theory and dismissed with prejudice its case seeking unredacted voter registration data, marking the department's 25th consecutive district court defeat in that nationwide campaign.
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background
Democracy Docket identifies controversial monitors sent to primaries — For earlier primary elections, the Civil Rights Division sent monitors including William Mohrman, who had represented the former Minneapolis police officer convicted of killing George Floyd, and David Michael Levin, a Florida lawyer who pleaded guilty in 2016 to illegally accessing government election websites.
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background
DOJ announces plan to send 1,000 election monitors to midterms — Earlier in the year, the DOJ's Civil Rights Division under Harmeet Dhillon announced it would deploy 1,000 federal election monitors to observe the 2026 general election, which would be the largest such contingent in U.S. history.