The Brennan Center for Justice, a nonpartisan law and policy organization focused on voting rights, is defending Minnesota’s refusal to give the Trump administration an unredacted list of the state’s voters, including driver’s license information and partial Social Security numbers.
[NOTE: The Justice Department has demanded complete voter files from at least 48 states, saying it needs the information to enforce federal election laws. States resisting argue both that elections are administered primarily by the states and that federal law does not authorize DOJ to collect protected private voter information.]
The Justice Department sued Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon after his office declined to provide the state’s complete voter-registration list. U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez dismissed the lawsuit in August, and the department appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit.
“A federal judge in Minnesota ruled the DOJ can’t force the state to hand over sensitive voter data,” the Brennan Center wrote after filing an appellate brief supporting the state.
A federal judge in Minnesota ruled the DOJ can’t force the state to hand over sensitive voter data. Now that DOJ is appealing, we’ve filed a brief in the Eighth Circuit defending Minnesota’s win, and its authority to run its own elections. Read: https://t.co/2nEFE7YHxK
— Brennan Center (@BrennanCenter) September 16, 2026
Minnesota answered 14 of the DOJ’s 15 inquiries but withheld the unredacted list because it contains “sensitive personal identifying information on several million individuals,” according to correspondence described in the Brennan Center’s brief.
Simon’s office also said the DOJ had failed to “identify any legal basis” entitling it to the protected information. The DOJ argued that the Civil Rights Act of 1960 and the Help America Vote Act give it authority to inspect the records while enforcing federal election laws and determining whether states are properly maintaining voter rolls.
[NOTE: The Trump administration has repeatedly asserted that U.S. elections are compromised by fraudulent votes, a claim for which there is little evidence.]
The Brennan Center, along with Campaign Legal Center, filed an amicus brief urging the appeals court to uphold Menendez’s decision, contending that the federal statutes cited by the government do not authorize the collection of states’ complete voter databases or override protections for private voter information.
[NOTE: An amicus curiae, or “friend of the court,” is not a party to the case but submits arguments or information that may help judges decide it.]
According to the brief, the Justice Department sued officials in 30 states and Washington, D.C. for refusing voter roll requests, and “every court that has decided the issue has dismissed these complaints.”
[NOTE: Voter-registration lists ordinarily contain both public and protected fields. Names, addresses, voting history, and party registration may be publicly available depending on state law, while driver’s-license numbers, Social Security information, and other identifiers are generally restricted.]
The Eighth Circuit will decide whether Minnesota must provide the information. Its ruling would establish precedent for federal courts in Minnesota, Iowa, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Missouri, and Arkansas.