Internal documents shed light on Trump’s crusade to vet state voter rolls

Internal Records Reveal Trump’s Voter Roll Scrutiny Campaign

CNN’s acquisition of internal Justice Department documents reveals that the Trump administration has spent nearly a year scrutinizing state voter rolls to eliminate noncitizens, employing a data system with known flaws and concealing its intentions from courts and Democratic officials.

Throughout this period, the White House remained informed about the Justice Department’s progress, despite the agency’s challenges in securing state cooperation for its extensive data requests, which eventually led to legal actions against 31 election officials.

A Key Moment in the Data Strategy

In a November 2025 email, Eric Neff, the current head of the DOJ voting section, emphasized the need to keep some election officials unaware of the administration’s specific plans for unredacted voter registration data. “Our response should always be: ‘We will use the data in a manner consistent with Federal law,’ and add no further details,” Neff stated, addressing a query from Democratic state officials about the use of the data in DHS’ “unproven and potentially insecure citizenship-check system.”

“Our response should always be: ‘We will use the data in a manner consistent with Federal law,’ and add no further details,” Neff stated, addressing a query from Democratic state officials about the use of the data in DHS’ “unproven and potentially insecure citizenship-check system.”

The lawsuit filed Tuesday by a voter advocacy group accuses the administration of building a voter surveillance and purging system without explicit legal authority, threatening millions of Americans’ voting and privacy rights. It also highlights how the DOJ’s data requests were framed as compliance checks under two federal laws, with Neff noting that “none of them require providing states with information about our intended use of the data.”

States have the option to voluntarily employ the SAVE program to audit their voter rolls, yet these audits have demonstrated the system’s potential to generate false positives, incorrectly flagging eligible voters as noncitizens. Election officials from both major parties have expressed concerns to CNN that the administration may leverage these audits to compel states into conducting flawed purges, risking voter disenfranchisement, and that resistance to such removals could be weaponized to question the legitimacy of November’s elections.

Exclusive CNN access to internal communications has illuminated how the voter data project came to be, as well as the administration’s struggle with state resistance to its sweeping data demands. Michael Gates, a Trump-appointed attorney who oversaw voting matters last year, noted in a summer email that the department aimed to “keep things moving” amid ongoing legal battles.

Trump’s push to “nationalize” elections has been further fueled by an executive order directing the US Postal Service to play a role in determining mail ballot eligibility. This, the lawsuit argues, constitutes an unlawful takeover of state authority, compounded by alleged violations of federal privacy laws in handling sensitive voter information.

The Justice Department has not responded to CNN’s request for comment on the matter.