FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL – Known actions by the Biden-Harris administration, coupled with secrecy, “create the impression” that the federal government has “the thumbscrew” in the Nov. 5 presidential election, says Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach.
Kobach, a Republican, is leading a multi-state lawsuit seeking to overturn President Joe Biden’s 2021 election executive order.
“It seems like it might be designed to register more Democrats than Republicans,” Kobach said of Biden’s order in a phone interview with The Daily Signal on Wednesday.
The Kansas Attorney General pointed to a letter cited in the footnotes of the lawsuit from March of this year in which Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin of Illinois and other Senate Democrats addressed U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland about voter registration through the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
“Durbin’s letter praises prison registration, and there are a disproportionate number of Democrats among those incarcerated,” Kobach told The Daily Signal.
Kobach and eight other attorneys general filed the lawsuit on Tuesday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas, calling for the repeal of Biden’s Executive Order 14019 – which he signed in March 2021 – as unconstitutional and illegal.
The lawsuit asks the court to prohibit all federal agencies from implementing Biden’s executive order to increase voter registration and turnout.
“President Biden has attempted to transform the federal bureaucracy into a voter registration organization and turn every interaction between a federal bureaucrat and a member of the public into a voter registration scam,” the lawsuit says. “This exceeds every authority executive agencies have under federal law, violates the Constitution, threatens the states’ attempt to regulate voter registration, and ultimately undermines the voter registration systems established by the states.”
The Biden-Harris administration argues that the order – which also provides for cooperation between authorities and private organizations – promotes voting rights.
Critics call the order “Bidenbucks” because it provides taxpayer-funded resources to mobilize likely Democratic voters.
The other Republican attorneys general in the case are Austin Knudsen of Montana, Brenna Bird of Iowa, Marty J. Jackley of South Dakota, Lynn Fitch of Mississippi, Michael T. Hilgers of Nebraska, Drew Wrigley of North Dakota, Gentner Drummond of Oklahoma and Alan Wilson of South Carolina.
Biden and his cabinet members are listed as defendants. Vice President Kamala Harris, the future Democratic presidential candidate, is not among them.
“This is very late, but better late than never,” attorney Cleta Mitchell, chair of the Election Integrity Network, told The Daily Signal. “Anything that can be done to stop this use and abuse of taxpayer money for partisan political activities must be done.”
Mitchell, a former member of the Oklahoma House of Representatives, said she was glad her state was among the plaintiffs.
The reason the lawsuit was filed more than three years after Biden signed the executive order was in part because of the secrecy surrounding it, Kobach told The Daily Signal.
“One reason is we didn’t know what the impact would be,” Kobach said. “If the administration had done this under the Administrative Procedure Act, there would have been public notice and comment. They just move on.”
The Kansas Attorney General added: “It would be interesting to know how many people were registered (to vote) through federal agencies and whether specific states were targeted.”
In their lawsuit, the attorneys general of the nine states express their frustration over the secrecy.
“Rather, an agency simply submits the plan to the White House; nothing else is required for the plan to be effective,” the complaint states at one point. “Moreover, in response to Freedom of Information Act requests, the Biden-Harris administration has stated that the plans are confidential and can be withheld from public scrutiny.”
In particular, the lawsuit raises an argument related to the separation of powers in government under the U.S. Constitution.
“The agencies cannot take money appropriated to them by Congress and reuse it for improper purposes. And they certainly cannot do so without following the laws that establish the procedures established by Congress,” the complaint states.
It continues: “President Biden had no legal authority to issue the EO (Executive Order). No provision of the Constitution gives him such power. Neither the NVRA nor any other federal law gives him such power.”
The acronym NVRA stands for National Voter Registration Act.
This is at least the third lawsuit challenging Biden’s executive order on voting rights. A group of Pennsylvania state legislators, all Republicans, filed a lawsuit in March. The America First Policy Institute, founded by veterans of the Trump-Pence administration, led a lawsuit challenging the order in July.
Separately, the House Committee on Election Administration has subpoenaed 15 Cabinet members to explain to Congress how Biden’s order will be implemented.
The lawsuit filed by the attorneys general of the nine states cites Durbin’s letter to Garland about voting information for federal prisoners as an example of agencies implementing the president’s executive order without following procedures established by Congress.
“For example, the U.S. Attorney General is allowing incarcerated felons to register as voters – but there has never been any announcement or comment about this action to give the public an opportunity to judge whether this is correct,” the lawsuit states. “And in many states, it is illegal for felons to vote. Because the U.S. Attorney General has not followed neutral procedures, the likelihood of potential conflicts between federal actions and state law is increased.”
The suit also points out that government services such as agricultural credit and government welfare are directed to conduct voter registrations under the order, which the plaintiffs point out could create misconceptions among the beneficiaries.
“They failed to consider that linking voter registration activities or materials to government benefits would pressure recipients of those benefits to either participate in those activities or register to vote,” the lawsuit states.
Neither the White House nor the Justice Department – which would defend the Biden-Harris administration’s policies – responded to the Daily Signal’s inquiries about the litigation.
Last week, however, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre responded to a reporter’s question related to the executive order.
“I think this is something that not only the vice president and the president have talked about, but of course since day one of their administration when the president signed an executive order that said, at the federal level, do everything we can to make sure that voting is more accessible to Americans across the country,” Jean Pierre said during the Aug. 6 press conference.
“And the president understands that and continues to do everything he can to make that possible,” she said.
Last month, Biden told the NAACP national convention that his executive order on voter participation was all he could do constitutionally, but he urged Congress to pass new measures to expand voting opportunities.
“Kamala and I are calling on Congress to pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act,” Biden told the audience. “I have done everything I can constitutionally with executive power, but we need the law. And we need to pass the Freedom to Vote Act. And I will sign both into law immediately.”
