Blue states get green light on suit over Trump’s election changes

Trump attempted in a March executive order to implement a proof of citizenship requirement for voting and ban mail-in ballots received after Election Day.

by Erik Uebelacker, Court House News, September 17, 2025

(CN) — A federal judge on Wednesday rejected the Trump administration’s request to dismiss a lawsuit challenging the president’s sweeping changes to the U.S. election process, which Democratic states claim is “blatantly unconstitutional.”

In a 30-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Denise Casper found that the states sufficiently pleaded their standing and that they’d face immediate harm under the new rules, which would implement a documentary proof of citizenship voting requirement and ban counting mail-in ballots received after Election Day.

The government sought to tie federal funds under the Help America Vote Act — a 2002 law aimed at making voting more inclusive, accessible and efficient — to the states’ compliance with the changes. This gives the states standing to sue, Casper said.

“This potential loss of federal funding is an imminently threatened economic injury sufficient to confer standing,” the Barack Obama appointee wrote, rejecting the government’s motion to dismiss.

A coalition of 19 states filed the lawsuit in Massachusetts federal court in April. They challenged an executive order from President Donald Trump that announced the new requirements, which the states say exceed the powers of the president and would disenfranchise lawful voters around the country.

In his ruling Wednesday, Casper didn’t make any determination on the lawfulness of the executive order, rather only if the states had the right to challenge it in court. The government argued that the states lack the ability to do so because it has yet to take any actions to enforce the new rules.

The judge disagreed, citing case law from a 2007 patent case that found “where threatened government action is concerned, a plaintiff is not required to expose himself to liability before bringing suit to challenge the basis for the threat.”

“The … states have alleged an injury sufficient to support standing and ripeness to challenge,” Casper wrote.

Casper already granted a preliminary injunction that blocked the Trump administration from implementing the changes, which she found “threaten[s] to chill voter registration and participation.”

Historically, the logistics of the voting process has been a state responsibility. But Congress can regulate voting with legislation like the Voting Rights Act, not the president, the judge acknowledged in her June ruling in favor of the states.

In that ruling, Casper also concluded that Trump’s order requiring proof of citizenship at the ballot box “appears likely to disproportionately disenfranchise Black and poorer Americans,” citing reports that roughly half of Americans lack a passport and that passport ownership increases dramatically with income.

The states expect that, as a result of that requirement, fewer eligible citizens will show out to vote.

The judge further found that Trump’s Election Day deadline for ballot receipts would force the states to drastically move cash and manpower to meet that requirement. Trump sought to change the longstanding rule that allows for votes to be counted so long as they are cast by Election Day, not necessarily received by then.

“Each of these changes would, in turn, divert the states’ resources from other key projects such as voter registration list maintenance and preparing for upcoming elections,” Casper wrote.

She is the second federal judge to block parts of the controversial executive order. In April, a federal judge in Washington, D.C., barred the administration from requiring heightened proof of U.S. citizenship to vote.

Casper’s ruling is broader, icing the Election Day ballot receipt deadline as well as the proof-of-citizenship requirements.

The 19 states behind the lawsuit include California, Nevada, Massachusetts, Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin — all states with Democratic attorneys general.

It’s one of several legal challenges around the country that target Trump’s March executive order, which he signed after years of stoking doubt about the integrity of U.S. elections and falsely claiming that he lost his 2020 presidential run due to widespread voter fraud.

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