A Bove and Beyond

This Week in Democracy

• The U.S. Senate confirmed Emil Bove to be a federal judge. Bove is a top Justice Department official who defended President Trump in the federal election interference and classified documents cases. Three whistleblowers came forward during Bove’s confirmation process, alleging that he suggested ignoring court orders in order to deport people and that he misled lawmakers during his confirmation hearings.

  The Senate also confirmed Joseph Kent as the head of the National Counterterrorism Center. Kent is an Army Special Forces veteran and former CIA officer who has promoted conspiracy theories about the 2020 presidential election and the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. He also has ties to extremist groups.

• The Justice Department filed a misconduct complaint against James Boasberg, a federal judge who blocked some of the Trump administration’s policies. It’s the latest escalation of the Trump administration’s efforts to weaken the judiciary.

  Earlier this year, Trump called for Boasberg to be impeached, leading to a rare rebuke from U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.

• Texas state lawmakers unveiled a proposal for how to redraw their state’s congressional districts. The new map aims to give Republicans an advantage in five U.S. House districts currently represented by Democrats.

  California Gov. Gavin Newsom has been discussing ways that his state can respond to the plans in Texas. This week, Newsom said that he would work with his state’s legislature on a plan to hold a November special election in which voters could approve a new congressional map.

• Trump asked a federal appeals court to review a district court judge’s order that blocked some of his executive order targeting elections from being enforced.

  The district court judge issued the block in June, ruling that the Constitution does not give the president any specific powers over elections. Trump’s order represents “undue interference” and would burden states with “significant efforts and substantial costs,” the judge wrote.

  ➡️ READ: Sharing the Facts About Federal Overreach of States’ Authority to Administer Elections

• Officials from 22 states sued the U.S. Department of Agriculture over its demand that states turn over the personal information—including Social Security numbers and home addresses—of applicants to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly called the Food Stamp Program.

  “This unprecedented demand that states turn over SNAP data violates all kinds of state and federal privacy laws and further breaks the trust between the federal government and the people it serves,” said California Attorney General Rob Bonta, who co-led the lawsuit.

• The Trump administration authorized the deployment of National Guard troops at Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities in 20 states. (Typically, governors have authority over National Guard troops.) Vermont Gov. Phil Scott denied Defense Sec. Pete Hegseth’s request to deploy his state’s Guard soldiers.

  The Department of Defense also sent home more than 1,000 National Guard troops deployed to Los Angeles. About 250 soldiers remain deployed as part of the administration’s response to protests against its immigration policies.

  ➡️ READ: Sharing the Facts About Domestic Military Deployment and State Authority

State of the States

In D.C., an attorney discipline board recommended that Jeffrey Clark lose his law license for his role in the plot to overturn the 2020 presidential election. Clark, a top Justice Department official in Trump’s first administration, allegedly drafted a letter to Georgia officials in December 2020 falsely claiming that the Justice Department had “significant concerns” about the integrity and outcome of the state’s election.

Clark “should be disbarred as a consequence and to send a message to the rest of the Bar and to the public that this behavior will not be tolerated,” the board wrote.

➡️ EXPLORE: Our resource about Clark’s disciplinary trial

In Illinois, a federal judge dismissed the Justice Department’s lawsuit against Gov. JB Pritzker, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, and other officials. The department filed the lawsuit in February over state policies that prohibit state and local officials from assisting federal immigration authorities.

“As state law allows, Illinois will assist the federal government when they follow the law and present warrants to hold violent criminals accountable,” Pritzker said in a statement. “But what Illinois will not do is participate in the Trump administration’s violations of the law and abuses of power.”

➡️ READ: Sharing the Facts About State and Local Authority to Set Public Safety & Law Enforcement Priorities

In Maine, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Utah, and Wisconsin, election officials pushed back against the Justice Department’s requests for information about their state’s voter registration lists.

In a statement, Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows pointed out that the Constitution gives states the power to run elections, not the federal government. “They have no right to the sensitive, personal information of every voter in the State of Maine,” she said. “We will be telling them that in the days to come.”

Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon’s office also declined to provide the requested information, writing to the Justice Department that it “will require clear legal justification for the data and sufficient information to show that the data will be protected and used properly before it can consider whether it is appropriate to share Minnesota’s voter registration list.”

A spokesperson for New Hampshire Secretary of State David Scanlan said state officials told the Justice Department that, in accordance with state law, their voter database is “private and confidential” and not subject to records requests.

Utah Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson provided the department with public information in her response. “Utah remains one of the most proactive states for maintaining current and accurate voter registration rolls,” she wrote.

“If they want protected data, there’s a process for government entities to request it for lawful purposes,” Henderson told The Salt Lake Tribune. “We’ll address that if it comes, but so far we haven’t identified any federal or state statute that would justify handing over to the federal government the personal identifying information of 2.1 million Utah voters.”

The Wisconsin Election Commission reminded the Justice Department in its response that to receive the data, the department would have to pay $12,500. A spokesman for the commission said that the department has not followed up since.

The Justice Department is planning on eventually requesting information from all 50 states, according to Democracy Docket.

In Nevada, Trump appointed Sigal Chattah to be the state’s acting U.S. attorney. Chattah is an Election Denier who ran for attorney general in 2022. This week, more than 100 former judges wrote to federal judges in Nevada, urging them to resist Chattah’s appointment.

Chattah originally assumed the role of U.S. attorney in April on an interim basis. Her 120-day term as interim U.S. attorney was scheduled to expire this week. Once her term was up, it would have been up to federal judges in the state to select a new officeholder. Instead, Chattah resigned on Monday, leaving the position vacant and giving Trump the authority to appoint an acting U.S. attorney—a position with a 210-day term that can be extended indefinitely—without the approval of the state’s judges or the Senate.

Trump used similar tactics last week to appoint Alina Habba, one of his former personal lawyers, to be the acting U.S. attorney for New Jersey, and this week to appoint Bill Essayli to the same position in the Los Angeles-based Central District of California.

Recommended Reading

Dr. Julio Frenk, the chancellor of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), published a letter to the UCLA community about the Trump administration freezing federal research funding.