President Donald Trump’s Justice Department has sued Illinois election officials for full access to the state’s voter registration database, including sensitive personal data sought as part of a nationwide effort that has raised red flags for privacy advocates.
Federal officials say their lawsuit filed Thursday in Springfield against Illinois State Board of Elections Executive Director Bernadette Matthews aims “to protect American citizens from vote dilution.”
When the Trump administration requested Illinois’ full voter database in July, state election officials provided names, addresses and ages at registration — but not dates of birth, ID numbers or social security numbers, as limited by state law.
The Justice Department says that’s not enough to support their investigation into whether state officials are following federal guidelines on removing registrations for voters who have died or moved.
Local authorities are responsible for most of that information, and handing it over would violate federal privacy law, too, state officials have argued.
Representatives for the state election board and Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul declined to comment on the suit.
The Trump administration is suing 22 states for complete voter rolls in what it calls an effort to ensure election integrity. Trump has long claimed rampant voter fraud led to his 2020 election loss to former President Joe Biden, though cases of fraud have proven exceedingly rare anywhere in the country.
The American Civil Liberties Union has called it an “effort to assemble a national voter database, which Congress has never authorized, and which could be used to try to disenfranchise voters.”
“The federal government’s use of this private voter data would also make this sensitive data more vulnerable to hackers and scammers,” ACLU leaders said while decrying a federal lawsuit filed in Rhode Island earlier this month.
Illinois election officials were sued along with their counterparts in Georgia, Wisconsin and Washington D.C. Ten states are complying with Trump administration demands, and three more have indicated they will, according to Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon.
“Today’s filings show that regardless of which party is in charge of a particular state, the Department of Justice will firmly stand on the side of election integrity and transparency,” Dhillon said in a statement.