Biden DOJ’s 2024 vot­ing bat­tles raise alarm for elec­tion integri­ty advo­cates

The Depart­ment of Justice’s recent plea to the Supreme Court to allow vot­ers in Ari­zona to apply for absen­tee bal­lots with­out doc­u­ment­ed proof of cit­i­zen­ship is one of sev­er­al instances of the Biden admin­is­tra­tion wad­ing into state-lev­el elec­tion bat­tles ahead of the 2024 elec­tion.
The DOJ has also pushed this year for more lenient mail-in vot­ing rules in Ohio and Alaba­ma, and it brought a law­suit to add more Span­ish-speak­ing poll work­ers in Rhode Island.
The department’s involve­ment in state elec­tion mat­ters is not new — the gov­ern­ment has since the 1960s had juris­dic­tion to enforce the Vot­ing Rights Act. The civ­il rights-era leg­is­la­tion was designed to make sure black cit­i­zens had an equal abil­i­ty to vote. The DOJ also has f …