The NAACP filed a lawsuit Friday alongside other civil rights groups targeting the Trump administration’s plans to deploy armed agents at U.S. polling places.
The suit comes ahead of November’s midterm elections and seeks to halt what the groups describe as unlawful intimidation of American voters across the country.
Named defendants in the lawsuit include the Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Department of Justice, the FBI, and several Trump administration officials.
The lawsuit specifically seeks to prevent those agencies from “deploying agents in a manner that unlawfully intimidates voters or anyone urging or aiding voters.”
The NAACP’s lawyers wrote that “Defendants’ statements and actions have made voters… afraid of appearing at polling places, helping others vote, serving as election volunteers, and advocating for their political beliefs and preferred candidates.”
The lawsuit is not the first legal challenge targeting the administration’s approach to polling place security during the upcoming midterm cycle.
The city of Denver filed a similar lawsuit earlier this month seeking to block ICE agents from patrolling polling sites, citing a federal law prohibiting the presence of “troops at polls.”
Democratic senators also pressed FBI Director Kash Patel earlier this week on whether his agency would comply if President Trump asked him to send agents to the polls.
The DOJ deployed election monitors during recent primary contests, including South Carolina’s GOP runoff and in Rhode Island, with such monitors typically drawn from the department’s Civil Rights Division.
In August, Trump left the door open to declaring a national security emergency and federalizing control of the midterms, saying “that stranger things have happened” when asked about the possibility.
The combination of aggressive agency deployments and Trump’s public statements has alarmed voting rights advocates who warn the moves could suppress turnout among minority and immigrant communities.
Civil rights organizations argue that the visible presence of armed federal agents near polling locations carries an inherently chilling effect on voter participation regardless of stated intent.
