Federal judge blocks Justice Department and Homeland Security pressure campaign on election officials ahead of US midterms
Judge Trina Thompson's emergency order bars the two departments from demanding ballot segregation, voter purges or halted counting, and from threatening election officials with prosecution.
A federal judge in San Francisco has imposed a sweeping emergency order halting a pressure campaign by the Trump administration against election officials across the United States, just days before the midterm elections on Tuesday, November 3.
United States District Judge Trina Thompson granted a temporary restraining order on Friday evening, ruling that recent tactics by the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security were likely to interfere with the running of the election and to disenfranchise lawful voters.
Under the order, the two departments may not demand that election officials in any state set aside or segregate ballots, remove voters from registration rolls, or stop processing ballots. They are also barred from threatening election officials with criminal prosecution, or from taking other action to threaten, intimidate or coerce them into changing ballot-processing procedures on the grounds that voters are ineligible.
Judge Thompson, who was appointed by former President Joe Biden, rejected the administration's argument that election officials could face federal prosecution for failing to do enough to prevent illegal voting. She wrote that when state and local employees distribute, process or count ballots, or otherwise administer the 2026 midterm election, in accordance with the law, they do not violate federal criminal law even if a particular ballot belongs to a registered voter alleged by the government to be ineligible.
The administration has said its actions are designed to stop unlawful voting by non-citizens, and it has argued for months that it can and will prosecute election officials who do not do enough to prevent it. The judge's opinion said that, whatever the stated aim, the effect of the tactics was likely to be interference with election administration and the disenfranchisement of lawful voters.
The order goes further than simply blocking the demands themselves. It also requires the administration to inform the judge of any search warrant applications, grand jury subpoenas, or other demands to access election materials or ballots that have been issued in connection with lists the administration has drawn up alleging that particular individuals are ineligible to vote.
The ruling is the latest court intervention in the final days of a fiercely contested midterm campaign. It follows a separate appeals court decision this week that refused, for a second time, to order California to set aside more than 20,000 mail-in ballots, and it comes as the Justice Department has widened its demands for election records from states across the country.
The timing matters because voting is already well under way. A record number of Americans have cast ballots early, with nearly 47.9 million early votes recorded before election day, and election officials in battleground states have been working under intense public scrutiny over how ballots are handled and counted.
The temporary restraining order is set to expire on November 16, almost two weeks after election day, which means it covers the counting period as well as the final days of campaigning. The Justice Department has been asked for comment on the ruling, and no response had been reported at the time of publication.
What happens next is now in the hands of the courts and the administration. The government could seek to challenge or narrow the order, the judge could extend it or convert it into a longer-lasting injunction after further hearings, and election officials will meanwhile continue processing ballots under the protection of the current order. For voters, the immediate practical effect is that the counting of ballots already cast is to proceed without the federal demands and threats that the court has now blocked.
