EPIC Urges First and Seventh Circuits to Protect Voter Privacy and Refuse DOJ’s Voter Roll Demand 

EPIC filed four amicus briefs this week urging the First and Seventh Circuit to rebuff the Department of Justice’s unlawful demand for voter rolls. EPIC was represented by pro bono counsel from Wilmer Hale.  

Since last May, the DOJ has baselessly demanded that nearly every state and Washington DC hand over unredacted voting registration lists as part of the administration’s wider efforts to suppress voting. These voting registration lists contain highly sensitive, personally identifiable information on millions of voters, including driver’s license numbers and partial or full Social Security Numbers. The DOJ has sued 30 states and Washington, DC for refusing to provide the unredacted voter registration lists. So far, 23 District Courts have dismissed the DOJ’s suit and found its claims meritless. Despite its staggering losses, DOJ has appealed to multiple federal courts of appeals. 

EPIC’s amicus briefs were filed in support of four different states. Three were in the First Circuit: United States v. Amore (Rhode Island), United States v. Bellows (Maine), and United States v. Galvin (Massachusetts). The last was in the Seventh Circuit: United States v. Wisconsin Election Commission et al (Wisconsin). 

In the briefs, EPIC argues that DOJ’s demand violates several federal privacy and data security laws. As EPIC has noted before, DOJ has failed to comply with even basic data security standards. In addition, DOJ’s demand for state voter rolls is an illegal demand for records on how Americans exercise their First Amendment rights. DOJ has also failed to comply with key transparency and oversight requirements despite already collecting voter roll data from several states. As the brief explains, DOJ’s actions violate the Privacy Act, the Federal Information Security Modernization Act, and the E-Government Act.  

These briefs are part of EPIC’s ongoing efforts to fight the administration’s illegal collection of state voter information, misuse of personal information, and attempted creation of national data banks. EPIC previously filed three amicus briefs in the Ninth and Sixth Circuits urging the courts to rebuff the DOJ’s unlawful demand for California’s, Oregon’s, and Michigan’s unredacted voter rolls. The Sixth Circuit affirmed the district court’s dismissal of DOJ’s suit against Michigan and subsequently denied DOJ’s petition for en banc review.