Stories

Browse major news stories and see what officials have said.

Sep 24, 2026· Updated

The Justice Department Says It Will Send a Record ~1,000 Monitors to the Midterm Polls — and a Senator Asks the Pentagon to Put in Writing That It Will Not Send Troops or Seize Ballots

Two announcements eleven weeks before the November 2026 midterms put the question of federal presence at American polling places back in front of Congress. On Monday, August 17, 2026, Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who runs the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, told Bloomberg Law that the department would deploy roughly 1,000 election monitors in November — "probably going to be a historic number for a Republican administration." Dhillon said the monitors would observe rather than intervene, would be trained on the same materials used by previous administrations, and would watch for language-access and disability-access barriers as well as suspected fraud. The number is many times what the department has typically fielded, and it lands as President Trump repeatedly predicts Democrats will "cheat" to retake Congress and after his call for Republicans to "nationalize" elections. The next day, Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), a former CIA analyst and Pentagon official, wrote to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine asking them to confirm in writing that the Defense Department "will not send Federal troops to the polls or to seize election materials of any kind." She pointed to Trump's 2020-era consideration of using the military to seize voting machines, his National Guard deployments to cities over Democratic governors' objections, and the 2025 deployment of active-duty Marines to Los Angeles. The Pentagon said it would respond through normal congressional correspondence channels; the Joint Chiefs did not comment. Hegseth, asked a version of the same question at an April 2026 hearing, called it a "gotcha hypothetical" but said he had never been ordered to do anything illegal and would not follow such an order. Republicans on the Senate Armed Services Committee had earlier blocked a Democratic amendment to strengthen the existing statutory bar on federal troops at polling places. Democrats had already gone to the department about the monitors: on August 3, 2026, Sens. Mark Warner and Tim Kaine led a ten-senator letter pressing DOJ to confirm the program would stay within its statutory limits and would not target jurisdictions on partisan lines. Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes, whose state saw monitors during the summer primary, has filed public records requests seeking the factual basis for the deployments.

“We are taking strong, joint legal action to block Donald Trump's threats to deploy federal agents, including ICE and FBI agents, to polling places this November. Sending armed federal agents into American neighborhoods to intimidate voters is not only wrong – it's illegal and would mark a new and extremely dangerous escalation of this administration's disregard for the rule of law and repeated attempts to rig the midterms. … Federal law explicitly forbids voter intimidation and stationing armed federal agents at polling places. Our case is clear, and we're confident we'll defeat Trump in court yet again.”
Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) · Sep 24, 2026

A Sitting Congressman Learns the FBI Recorded His Calls — Rep. Suhas Subramanyam Releases the DOJ Notice Showing a Wiretap Swept Up His Conversations With the Virginia Senate Leader Who Ran the Redistricting Referendum

On September 3, 2026 Rep. Suhas Subramanyam (D-VA-10) released a notice he said the Justice Department and FBI had sent him disclosing that a federal judge authorized a wiretap in early March 2026 that intercepted some of his own phone calls between March 6 and April 5. The tap was placed as part of the Justice Department's corruption investigation into L. Louise Lucas, the president pro tempore of the Virginia Senate, over an alleged bribery scheme connected to a marijuana dispensary business she co-owns. Lucas has not been charged and denies wrongdoing. Subramanyam did not dispute that he was incidentally captured rather than targeted, but pointed at the calendar: the interception window sat at the peak of campaigning for Virginia's redistricting referendum, which Lucas helped lead, and overlapped with the House Oversight Committee's push to make then-Attorney General Pam Bondi testify about the Epstein files. He placed the wiretap in a line that runs through the Department's investigations of Democratic state attorneys general and the former FBI director, and said the surveillance would not deter Democratic oversight of the administration. The FBI declined to comment and the Justice Department did not respond to reporters. The investigation itself predates the current administration — it was opened under President Biden — and the FBI's May 6, 2026 search of Lucas's Portsmouth office and cannabis business had already drawn a round of statements from Virginia Democrats, most of whom stopped short of asserting the probe was manufactured while insisting the political context could not be ignored.

“The timing of this wiretap and investigation is extremely suspicious. The tap took place between March and May, which was at the peak of campaigning for the redistricting referendum in Virginia. This was also while the Oversight Committee was calling on Pam Bondi to testify on the Epstein investigation.”
Suhas Subramanyam (D-VA) · Sep 3, 2026

The Justice Department Withdraws a Clinton-Era Opinion and Tells Every Agency of Every State — DMVs and Public Universities Included — to Report Undocumented Immigrants to DHS or Put $76 Billion in Welfare Money at Risk

On Wednesday, September 2, 2026, the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel published an opinion withdrawing a 1998 Clinton-administration opinion and sharply expanding which parts of state government must report people they know to be unlawfully present in the United States to the Department of Homeland Security. The 1996 welfare-reform law conditions participation in Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and Supplemental Security Income on reporting known undocumented immigrants to federal immigration authorities. The 1998 opinion read that duty narrowly, as binding only the state agencies that actually administer TANF and SSI benefits. The new opinion reads it to reach every agency of any state that takes the money — motor vehicle departments, public universities, and state and local bodies that never touch a welfare file. The stakes are large: federal TANF block grants run past $16.4 billion a year and federal SSI benefits exceed $60 billion. The Office of Legal Counsel said states that do not want the obligation are free to stop taking the funds. The opinion arrived days after a coalition of Democratic attorneys general sued to stop DHS from getting TANF data at all, and it is expected to draw its own legal challenge from Democratic-led states.

“The mandatory reporting obligations … thus apply to all agencies within a state that participates in the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and Supplemental Security Income programs subject to those requirements. States remain free to reevaluate their participation in TANF or SSI going forward in view of today’s opinion.”
Joshua Craddock (R-DC) · Sep 2, 2026

Aug 28, 2026· Updated

The Justice Department Sues Arizona, New Mexico, Oregon and Washington Over In-State Tuition for Dreamers — Bringing Its Running Total to 21 States, and in Arizona Suing to Void a Law the Voters Passed Themselves

On Thursday, August 27, 2026, the Justice Department filed suit against Arizona, New Mexico, Oregon and Washington over state laws that let undocumented students who graduated from in-state high schools pay in-state tuition at public colleges. The four filings brought the administration's running total to 21 states sued over the same policy. The Arizona case is the most politically loaded of the four: the policy at issue, Proposition 308, was approved directly by Arizona voters in 2022. The Justice Department's complaint calls it "blatant unequal treatment favoring illegal aliens over U.S. citizens" and argues it is preempted by federal law. Arizona's attorney general answers that Prop 308 does not turn on residency at all — it turns on where a student went to high school and graduated — and that the fight is fundamentally about states' rights. Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting has estimated more than 3,600 noncitizens could qualify; at least 720 have received in-state tuition, including 432 at Arizona State University. The governors of Oregon and Washington both said they would defend their laws. Arizona's two Democratic senators issued a joint statement calling the suit an attack on people "deeply rooted in America." Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward framed the filings as enforcement of "Congress's clear prohibition on placing aliens over citizens."

“Dreamers are Americans in every way. They grew up here, went to our schools, and are contributing to communities across Arizona. Making college more expensive for young people who are deeply rooted in America does nothing to fix our broken immigration system or make our country safer.”
Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) · Aug 28, 2026

The Third Circuit Rules 2-1 That the Speech or Debate Clause Does Not Shield Rep. LaMonica McIver — Sending the Only Member of Congress Indicted by Trump’s Justice Department to Trial Ten Weeks Before the Midterms

On August 26, 2026, a divided panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit ruled that Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-NJ) is not immune from prosecution on charges arising from a May 2025 congressional oversight visit to the Delaney Hall immigration detention facility in Newark. The 2-1 panel allowed two of three counts of impeding and interfering with federal officers to proceed to trial and remanded the third to the district court. Writing for the majority, Judge Cindy Chung held that the charged conduct — physical contact with two officers — was "unambiguously non-legislative" and that the Speech or Debate Clause immunizes legislative acts only. Judge Thomas Ambro dissented in part, writing that the Constitution does not permit the Executive to wield prosecutorial discretion in retaliation against disfavored legislators, and would have allowed McIver discovery into the government's motives. McIver, who is running for reelection while under indictment, said the court "got it wrong" and that the ruling "chills" congressional oversight authority. The charges were originally brought by Alina Habba, whose appointment as U.S. Attorney for New Jersey the same court later found unlawful. Rep. Frank Pallone (D-NJ) and New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill both said publicly they stand with her. No Republican member of Congress was on record about the ruling in the first 48 hours.

“Today's decision chills that authority and emboldens the Trump administration to continue persecuting our most vulnerable communities, those who try to defend them, and anyone who dares hold the president or his lackeys accountable.”
LaMonica McIver (D-NJ) · Aug 26, 2026

Trump’s Pardon Attorney Ed Martin Leaves the Justice Department to Fight "Legal Battles" for the Midterms — the Same Day House Judiciary Democrats Report That the Clemency Operation He Ran Erased $1.7 Billion Owed to Crime Victims

On Friday, August 21, 2026, President Trump announced on Truth Social that Ed Martin — his U.S. pardon attorney, former head of the Justice Department's "Weaponization Working Group," and former interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia — is leaving the administration to work on election litigation for the November midterms and the 2028 presidential race. Attorney General Todd Blanche called Martin a "patriot who loves this nation"; Martin posted "Proud to serve. Fight Fight Fight." Martin had been one of the most contested figures in the second Trump Justice Department. He replaced career pardon attorney Liz Oyer, who was fired in 2025 and said the office had been politicized. He was named a special attorney on mortgage-fraud investigations into Sen. Adam Schiff and New York Attorney General Letitia James — sending James a letter urging her to resign "as an act of good faith" and posing for photographs outside her Brooklyn home — and the case against James was later dismissed when a judge found the prosecutor who brought it had been illegally appointed. Martin was removed as head of the Weaponization Working Group earlier in 2026 while keeping the pardon attorney title. The same day, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, released a 25-page committee staff report titled "Pardons, Inc.: How Trump and His Clemency-for-Cash Racket Let White-Collar Criminals and International Drug Dealers Walk Free and Dodge Billions in Restitution Owed to Their Victims." The report finds that Trump's clemency grants have wiped out nearly $1.7 billion in restitution, fines and forfeitures owed to victims and taxpayers — up from the committee Democrats' $1.3 billion estimate a year earlier — and argues the White House replaced the DOJ's traditional review criteria with a pay-to-play process running on political contributions, Trump family business ties and MAGA-connected intermediaries. Cases cataloged in the report include Nikola founder Trevor Milton, pardoned after $1.8 million in donations to Trump-aligned committees and released from roughly $700 million in restitution; health care executive Paul Walczak, pardoned weeks after his mother attended a $1 million Mar-a-Lago fundraiser, escaping $4.5 million in stolen payroll taxes; Jason Galanis, who avoided some $84 million in restitution after testifying for Republicans during impeachment proceedings; and Ozy Media's Carlos Watson, whose $37 million in victim restitution was forgiven. The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report.

“I know he will do an outstanding job, ensure Free, Fair, and Honest Elections, and strongly advance our Constitutional Rights.”
Donald Trump (R-FL) · Aug 21, 2026

A Career Civil Rights Lawyer Says the Administration's Campus Antisemitism Investigations Were "Predetermined, Without Regard to the Evidence" — and Jamie Raskin Opens an Investigation Calling Them a "Pre-Baked Frame-Up"

On August 18, 2026, lawyers for Haley Van Erem — a career attorney who spent nearly a decade in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division before being detailed to the multi-agency antisemitism task force — filed a 28-page whistleblower disclosure with the inspectors general at DOJ and HHS and with the Office of Special Counsel. The disclosure alleges that the Title VI investigations of Harvard, Brown, Columbia and Cornell were marked by "extraordinary procedural irregularities, predetermined outcomes without factual or legal support," that "the outcomes of the investigations were predetermined, without regard to the evidence," and that the whole exercise was a "politically mandated effort" to extract money through settlement demands and funding freezes. It says hundreds of millions of dollars were suspended before the investigations were finished, that Columbia investigators flagged false statements and constitutionally protected activity being cited as Title VI violations, that a Harvard-assigned attorney warned the proposed settlement demands were unrelated to remedying antisemitism and likely violated the First Amendment, and that the task force also targeted Muslim professors. Van Erem left the department in May 2025, she says, because she was "unwilling to be made vulnerable to further participation in politically motivated investigations unsupported by facts and contrary to law." Columbia agreed to pay $200 million over three years and Brown agreed to spend $50 million on Rhode Island workforce development, both without findings of wrongdoing. The same day the disclosure surfaced, Rep. Jamie Raskin, the ranking Democrat on House Judiciary, wrote to Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon demanding documents and a transcribed interview before September 1. A Justice Department spokesperson said Van Erem "did not work on university investigations" and that the department "stands behind the integrity of these investigations."

“Antisemitism at American universities and medical schools is real. It needs to be addressed seriously. But your "investigation" into antisemitism was fake, a pre-baked frame-up operation thoroughly political in nature.”
Jamie Raskin (D-MD) · Aug 18, 2026

The Ninth Circuit — Two Trump Appointees Among Them — Rules the Attorney General Cannot Install Unconfirmed U.S. Attorneys by Naming Them "First Assistant" to a Job That Is Already Vacant

On August 17, 2026, a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed a district court order disqualifying Sigal Chattah from running the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Nevada, holding that the Justice Department's workaround for keeping unconfirmed prosecutors in place is unlawful. Writing for the panel, Judge Eric Miller — a Trump appointee, joined by fellow Trump appointee Stanley Blumenfeld and Clinton appointee Sidney Thomas — framed the question directly: "These cases present the question whether the Attorney General can make someone an Acting United States Attorney — bypassing the usual requirement that a U.S. Attorney be confirmed by the Senate — by designating that person as the first assistant to an already-vacant office of U.S. Attorney. We hold that the Attorney General cannot do so." Under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, the panel held, automatic succession runs only to a first assistant who already held that post when the vacancy arose. Chattah was named interim U.S. attorney in 2025 under 28 U.S.C. § 546 after Jason Frierson resigned, and was never confirmed — Nevada's two Democratic senators blocked her, citing her record as an election denier. When her 120-day interim term ran out, the department designated her first assistant so she could serve as acting U.S. attorney indefinitely. The Ninth Circuit is the second appeals court to reject that maneuver, after the Third Circuit ruled against Alina Habba's tenure in New Jersey. A Justice Department spokesperson said the department disagreed with the ruling and would appeal to the Supreme Court.

“Sigal Chattah has always been unfit to serve as Nevada's U.S. Attorney, and I'm glad to see the Ninth Circuit agree her appointment is illegal. It's past time for her to vacate the position and leave the U.S. Attorney's office once and for all.”
Jacky Rosen (D-NV) · Aug 17, 2026

Eight Days After Being Sworn In, Attorney General Todd Blanche Refuses to Pledge That the Justice Department Will Act Independently of the White House — "No Attorney General Should Ever Pledge That"

In his first Sunday-show interview as attorney general, Todd Blanche was asked by NBC's Kristen Welker on the August 16, 2026 edition of "Meet the Press" whether he could pledge that the Justice Department would always act independently of the White House. He answered: "No, I'm not going to pledge that. And no attorney general should ever pledge that." Blanche went further, saying he would of course weigh President Trump's views in individual prosecution decisions, while insisting that Trump does not call him to order specific prosecutions and would never ask him to do anything unethical or illegal. In the same interview he declared the $1.8 billion "anti-weaponization fund" permanently dead — "There is no fund, there will be no fund" — and said he "absolutely" supports U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro, whose handling of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool case Trump had publicly demanded she revisit. The remarks landed eight days after the Senate confirmed Blanche 50-49, with Republicans Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski joining every Democrat in opposition over precisely this concern — that Trump's former personal defense lawyer could not separate himself from the president. Post-Watergate norms have generally insulated Justice Department charging decisions from White House direction; Blanche's answer amounted to a public rejection of that convention. Congress was in August recess when he spoke, muting the immediate congressional response.

“I absolutely support US attorney Pirro, as does President Trump.”
Todd Blanche (R) · Aug 16, 2026

Congressional Black Caucus Asks Attorney General Blanche and FBI Director Patel for a Federal Review of Nolan Wells's Death, as Mississippi's Governor Blames Civil Rights Activists

Nolan Wells, an 18-year-old Black college athlete from Ocean Springs, Mississippi, went missing on July 4, 2026, after taking a boat to Horn Island — a barrier island off the Mississippi Gulf Coast — with a group of white friends for an Independence Day gathering. His body was recovered from the island's shoreline days later. State authorities have said he may have accidentally drowned; his family disputes that account, and a second, family-commissioned autopsy produced findings the family says the first did not. On August 12, 2026, Congressional Black Caucus Chair Rep. Yvette D. Clarke (D-N.Y.) and caucus members sent a letter to Attorney General Todd Blanche and FBI Director Kash Patel asking the Justice Department to determine whether an independent federal review — including a possible civil rights investigation — is warranted, and demanding a written response within seven days. The letter said that "more than 30 days after his disappearance and death, significant questions remain unanswered about the events of July 4, 2026." The Justice Department confirmed receiving the letter and said the appropriate personnel were "reviewing it carefully." The caucus made its case publicly on August 13 at the National Association of Black Journalists convention, where Wells's parents appeared alongside Rep. Lucy McBath (D-Ga.), attorney Ben Crump, and the Rev. Al Sharpton. Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), the state's only Black member of Congress, had already called for FBI involvement in late July, citing the state's history and inconsistencies between the two autopsies. Ocean Springs is not in Thompson's district. Mississippi's Republican statewide officials have pushed back on the pressure campaign. Gov. Tate Reeves blamed Crump and Sharpton for threats made against witnesses in the case, saying they were "stoking division for personal gain," and Attorney General Lynn Fitch defended the handling of the investigation by state and local law enforcement. Federal authorities separately arrested three people over alleged violent threats connected to the case, and the family's attorney has said a grand jury review could come within 30 days.

“Here we are again today, here for the loss of another black young man in our community. That is the reason why we’re asking for the accountability: to make sure that this is not just swept under the rug.”
Lucy McBath (D-GA) · Aug 13, 2026