The top leaders of the Democratic Party in the United States, the majority leader in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hakeem Jeffries, have filed a lawsuit against the Administration of Donald Trump. The legal action, supported by other officials and Democratic organizations, denounces "a constant flow of threats and intimidation" coming from the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security against election officials "across the country" ahead of the midterm elections, known as 'midterms'.
According to the text of the lawsuit, which Europa Press has accessed, "Officials from the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) have attempted to bolster their interference efforts through a constant flow of threats and intimidation directed at state and local election officials across the country," before adding that "last summer, prominent members of the Trump administration maintained a persistent pattern of threats against state election officials".
The plaintiffs argue that this escalation "just a few days ago" reached its peak with a statement from Trump himself, who warned that if the state authorities of California did not comply with his demands, "if the state officials of California do not submit to his will: 'everyone will go to jail for a long time'", referring to a message posted by the former president on social media last Saturday.
The legal document argues that "this pattern of intimidation is not based on any legitimate belief that election officials are committing irregularities," but rather responds to the "objective" of the Executive to "intimidate" those responsible for election administration "to yield to the demands of the Administration".
According to the lawsuit, these demands "consist of illegally removing voters from the rolls, denying ballots to duly registered voters, and segregating votes legally cast by registered citizens, based on spurious and unfounded allegations questioning their citizenship".
"None of this is legal," emphasize the Democratic leaders, who also underline that "the Executive Power has no authority to oversee the maintenance of state voter rolls, to override the states' decisions on who is eligible to vote, nor to determine who receives a ballot or which votes should be segregated."
The bet of the Democratic leaders in Congress to take the pulse with the Trump Administration to the courts occurs in the midst of the midterm election campaign, an electoral cycle marked by the repeated attempts of Trump's team to limit mail-in voting and to impose strict and controversial controls on the census, in a context where the main polls predicted the loss of the House of Representatives by the Republican Party and a very tight Senate.