Transcript: Marc Elias on Trump’s Attempts to Subvert the Midterms

The election rights lawyer talks about the legal strategies that the administration and Republican governments have already tried, and what may lie ahead.

The following is a transcript of a conversation between election rights lawyer Marc Elias, TNR’s Win McCormack, and Carol Butler. The transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

Marc Elias: Donald Trump’s going to impose provisions [attacking voting rights] through executive orders. He issued a voting executive order last year that we were successful in striking down, and we will succeed in striking [the next] one down.… The Department of Justice right now is operating like his private law firm and is seeking to obtain confidential voter data from all 50 states, plus the District of Columbia.

Win McCormack: Oh, I thought it had stopped with Georgia and Arizona.

Marc Elias: No, no. So those are the ballots that they’re seeking from 2020. They have seized the ballots from Georgia from 2020, and they have [sued to get] the ballots from Arizona from 2020, but the Department of Justice is suing to get access, essentially, to the unredacted voter rolls in all 50 states. And they’re suing 30 of those states, and we have intervened to oppose them in all those states. And so I think that’s one of the big battles to focus on, because if you want to run a voter-turnout program, you need the voter files, but if you also want to run a voter suppression operation at scale, you need the voter files. We’re entering the season in which we will see lots of different state laws by Republican legislatures try to suppress voting rights, and we’re litigating against those. We’re going to see more efforts by the administration, perhaps, to deploy federal paramilitary like [U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement]. And we’ll have to be prepared to litigate against that. It’s just gonna be a knife fight from here to the end.

Carol Butler: Can I ask a question on the private voter roll data? I know that a lot of [states’ attorneys general] have been filing lawsuits. Have some A.G.s been beaten in court anywhere on this yet? Have there been any victories on that?

Elias: Seventeen states turned them over voluntarily. Thirty states and D.C. have fought [back]. In the 30 states that have fought, we have intervened to defend voters in all 30. We have won alongside the A.G.s in Oregon, California, and … Michigan. There are three states that have dismissed their claims. So we are awaiting decisions in the other states

McCormack: And is there anything in the law that actually gives [Republicans] the right to have what they want?

Elias: No. [Laughter.] They’re claiming their versions of the law that let them have access to this, but this is unprecedented, and there’s a reason why we’re 3 and 0, and soon to be 4 and 0, then 5 and 0, and then 6 and 0. Look, they are trying to bully these states in ways that you see them try to bully states in other arenas. The challenges are that the Department of Justice can literally litigate everywhere. But for every state that opposes this, we also have states like Florida, Texas, Alabama, and Mississippi that are voluntarily complying with these requests. And that’s going to be a challenge as we........

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