Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach has made Kansas part of a federal lawsuit against President Joe Biden, led by Montana but filed in Kansas, over a voter registration executive order.
Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen filed the lawsuit on Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Wichita. The lawsuit concerns Biden’s Executive Order 14019 from 2021.
“The head of each agency shall examine ways in which the agency can, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law, promote voter registration and voter participation,” Biden’s order states.
The attorneys general of Montana, Kansas, Iowa, Mississippi, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina and South Dakota claim the order is unconstitutional.
“Fair elections are an essential part of our country’s republic,” Knudsen said in a statement. “Congress gave states the power to oversee elections years ago. I will not stand idly by while the Biden-Harris administration shamelessly tries to harvest votes by using its own voter registration agencies and ignoring states’ voter registration systems, thereby compromising the integrity of our elections.”
The states as well as several federal agencies and their department heads are suing Biden.
“It is the policy of my administration to promote and defend the right to vote for all Americans who are legally entitled to participate in elections,” Biden said in his order. “It is the responsibility of the federal government to expand access to and education about voter registration and voting information and to combat misinformation to enable all eligible Americans to participate in our democracy.”
Jason Alatidd is a statehouse reporter for the Topeka Capital-Journal. He can be reached by email at [email protected]. Follow him on X @Jason_Alatidd.
