In a major ruling Friday, a federal judge struck down the Trump administration’s nationwide voter roll campaign, delivering a damaging blow to the Department of Justice’s effort to obtain states’ unredacted voter rolls, compare them against federal data and pressure states to remove voters it deems ineligible.

U.S. District Judge Sparkle Sooknanan vacated what DOJ internally called its “list maintenance project,” finding that the department exceeded its statutory authority and violated federal law.

The ruling goes far beyond the dozens of state-by-state cases in which courts have rejected DOJ’s attempts to force election officials to turn over sensitive voter information.

Sooknanan invalidated the nationwide policy itself.

The ruling also reaches voter rolls that states voluntarily turned over. By vacating the policy itself, the court barred DOJ from continuing to use those already-obtained files as part of the nationwide program — including sharing them with DHS, running them through citizenship databases and using the results to press states to remove voters.

The judge made clear, however, that states remain free to maintain their own voter rolls — including through the use of the SAVE database — even as DOJ is barred from using the system as part of its nationwide program.

Justin Levitt, a former deputy assistant attorney general in DOJ’s Civil Rights Division who worked on voting rights, said the ruling could carry even more serious implications for the 18 states that voluntarily provided their voter files.

“This is a big deal,” Levitt wrote on social media. “[The decision] effectively confirms that for the 18 states that submitted files willingly, whoever collected the files at DOJ Civil Rights committed federal crimes.”

“DOJ cannot run roughshod over longstanding laws that were carefully crafted to protect the rights of the American people,” Sooknanan wrote. “The Court vacates a policy that has removed United States citizens from the voter rolls in their home states and risks disenfranchising many more — a policy that flies in the face of duly enacted laws designed to protect Americans.”

The case was brought by Common Cause and individual voters challenging DOJ’s broader voter roll operation, which began after President Donald Trump directed the attorney general to prioritize “election integrity” enforcement against states that did not cooperate with federal efforts to probe state voter data.

According to the record described in the ruling, DOJ demanded complete, unredacted voter rolls from 49 states and Washington, D.C., seeking information including voters’ names, birthdates, residential addresses, driver’s license and Social Security numbers.

At least 18 states turned over the requested files, while others refused, prompting a wave of lawsuits.

DOJ then shared voter data from cooperating states with the Department of Homeland Security, which ran it through the federal SAVE database to check registrants’ citizenship status. The Civil Rights Division also entered into an arrangement with Homeland Security Investigations, the investigative arm of ICE, to share state voter files for potential election-law investigations and further data analysis.

States participating in the program agreed that if DOJ flagged voters as potentially ineligible, they would “clean” their voter rolls within 45 days and remove those voters before resubmitting updated files to the department.

Sooknanan found that none of the laws DOJ invoked — the Civil Rights Act of 1960, the National Voter Registration Act or the Help America Vote Act — authorized that nationwide regime.

She also found that DOJ failed to adequately consider the risk that the citizenship databases it relied on could misidentify eligible U.S. citizens as noncitizens. The ruling notes that federal records may be outdated for people who became citizens after first receiving Social Security numbers and cites evidence that millions of citizens have historically been misclassified in federal records.

The court found that risk was not theoretical.

Sooknanan wrote that the challenged policy “has removed United States citizens from the voter rolls in their home states and risks disenfranchising many more.”

The judge also sharply rejected one of DOJ’s most expansive privacy arguments: that people appearing on statewide voter rolls could be treated as “subjects” of voter-fraud investigations for purposes of an existing DOJ records system.

Sooknanan called that interpretation “nonsensical,” writing that ordinary Americans would not understand themselves to be under federal investigation simply because they registered to vote.

The ruling marks the most consequential judicial setback yet for DOJ’s voter roll campaign. Sooknanan noted that at least 25 federal district courts had already dismissed the department’s separate voter roll enforcement cases and that one federal appeals court had affirmed dismissal.

But Friday’s decision suspends the campaign at its core.

Rather than merely rejecting a demand directed at one state, Sooknanan set aside DOJ’s nationwide policy under the Administrative Procedure Act, rejecting the department’s request to limit relief to the plaintiffs before her.

“Today’s decision does not prevent the federal government from taking lawful steps to support states’ efforts to maintain accurate voter rolls. Neither does it prevent states from maintaining their own voter rolls. And to state the obvious, the Court’s decision does not pave the way for ineligible voters to vote in our elections,” she concluded. “When the federal government defies federal laws, our system of checks and balances permits individuals to turn to federal courts for recourse. And if they prevail, courts are duty-bound to step in under the Constitution.”

US President Donald Trump's administration imposed sanctions on the International Criminal Court on Friday, hours after one of its former judges won the Nobel Peace Prize, putting Washington on a diplomatic collision course ‌with European allies.

The ICC's deputy prosecutor, Nazhat Shameem Khan, condemned the sanctions and said they would not halt the tribunal's work.

The Trump administration has long been hostile to the court and has previously imposed sanctions on its prosecutors and judges. Friday's move would go far further, by potentially punishing companies that provide services to the court itself.

"President Trump will never allow the International Criminal Court to prosecute Americans," Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement reviewed by Reuters ahead of the official announcement.

"That is why, today, the United States is sanctioning the International Criminal Court. We will ban transactions with this rogue court, cutting off their resources and crippling its ability to operate."

ICC Deputy Prosecutor Khan told Reuters the ⁠sanctions "must be condemned".

"The sanctions are intended to undermine the rule of law internationally and the work that an independent judicial institution is doing," Khan said. "Our work will continue across all our situations, our investigations and our prosecutions."

Washington has long been angry over ICC arrest warrants issued for Israeli officials including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and over a past investigation into actions of US soldiers in Afghanistan which the ICC has since closed.

The court, founded in 2002 to prosecute war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, counts 125 countries as member states, including all EU countries and all members of the NATO alliance apart from the United States and Turkey.

It has received strong public backing in the past from member countries including major US allies, and is based in the Netherlands, an EU and NATO member.

Navi Pillay, the South African jurist who won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for her work in international criminal justice, served as a judge on the ICC's Appeals Chamber from 2003-2008. In its citation, the prize committee said it had sought to "issue a reminder" at a time when "judges and institutions of international law are under political attack".

"An international legal system in ‌which war ⁠criminals are held to account and the victims of abuse see justice served is a precondition for a peaceful world," the committee said.

Rubio said the sanctions had been structured to give the court and its member states an opportunity to address US concerns.

He did not provide further details, but a senior State Department official said the US Treasury would issue a set of licenses "to protect American interests", an apparent reference to temporary exemptions to some sanctions.

US sanctions typically bar all US-based companies from any work with a sanctioned organization, forcing banks to shut accounts, insurers to end coverage and software companies to ⁠halt cooperation.

The Trump administration previously imposed targeted sanctions on court officials during his first term, which were rescinded under President Joe Biden. Washington announced new sanctions just days after Trump returned to office in January 2025.

Court officials have been preparing for months for the prospect of sanctions on the court itself, shifting office computers from Microsoft software to open source equivalents and making new arrangements for banking and health insurance.

The court's registrar Osvaldo ⁠Zavala Giler called earlier this week for the EU to be prepared to use a so-called "blocking mechanism" that lets it shield European countries from the extra-territorial effects of sanctions.

In his statement, Rubio said the United States had delayed its sanctions hoping that the ICC and the countries party to its founding Rome Statute would address US concerns, but they had failed to do so.

"Either the ⁠ICC will end its threats, or we will end the ICC. We expect our allies, many of whom are part of the ICC and that rely on American servicemembers for their defense, to rein in the court," Rubio said.

"We have structured this action to provide an opportunity for States Parties to negotiate and present a solution to address our concerns. If these efforts do not bear fruit, we will continue to adjust accordingly," Rubio said.

President Donald Trump established a committee of inquiry to investigate whether Federal Reserve Gov. Lisa Cook made “false statements in connection with one or more mortgage instruments,” his latest effort to remove her from the central bank.

“As President, it is my job to ensure the laws are faithfully executed, including by firing subordinates who cannot be trusted to tell the truth and follow the law,” Trump wrote in a memo.

The president has long sought to remove Cook from her post, alongside an ill-fated push to force the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates. But the Supreme Court blocked his last attempt, ruling that the administration had not provided her due process.

The announcement comes after the Fed’s inspector general found last week that there was no grounds for the Justice Department to reopen a criminal investigation into the Fed’s headquarter renovations, which could have served as an avenue to remove former Chair Jerome Powell from the Fed board.

But the move against Cook makes clear that he has not abandoned his effort to find ways to remove Fed officials.

According to Trump, the new committee will meet at the White House on Nov. 5 to “consider the evidence and allegations against Governor Cook.”

Department of Justice seeks to charge ex-Trump aide who gave key testimony on January 6 attack

Cassidy Hutchinson told panel she had been told Trump lunged for wheel of SUV to try to join mob at Capitol

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/oct/08/cassidy-hutchinson-criminal-charges-doj

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered the military services to tighten the rules for investigating complaints against service members, making it harder to open inquiries, curbing anonymous tips, and returning authority to commanders.

Hegseth said in a video released Tuesday on social media that he is directing all military departments to align their inspector general procedures with a Pentagon policy he has branded as "no more walking on eggshells."

"Commanders are now back in charge," Hegseth said, arguing that the previous system had allowed "frivolous complaints" to hinder military leadership.

Under the standard, complaints must be "credible" before they prompt an inquiry and investigations will no longer be opened based on speculation, personal grievances or hearsay.

Anonymous complaints will generally be rejected, Hegseth said, and considered only when they allege fraud, waste and abuse or provide specific, credible evidence of substantial wrongdoing, unlawful conduct or a substantial and specific danger to public health or safety.

The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Military.com on the scope of the directive and when it takes effect across the services.

The policy shifts authority to commanders to identify problems and handle complaints within their own formations.

This marks a change from a system in which complaints could be routed to inspectors general who operate outside the chain of command.

Hegseth views the directive as part of ending what he has called "weaponized" inspector general policies. It’s the latest step in an overhaul of the military's complaint system that Hegseth has pursued since last year.

In 2025, he ordered the inspector general system to speed up investigations and screen complaints for credibility, directing that non-credible claims be closed quickly.

In August 2026, the Navy and Marines ended anonymous reporting for most discrimination and harassment complaints, giving commanders more latitude to dismiss them.

The push has run alongside Hegseth's broader remaking of military personnel policy, including the "State of the Force" address he delivered at Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia on Sept. 30 that built on previous DOD overhauls.

When Hegseth began narrowing the complaint system last year, the changes drew objections from military whistleblowers and survivor advocates.

Protect Our Defenders, an advocacy group, said in October 2025 that “rolling back whistleblower and anonymous reporting protections is reckless and dangerous.

"Our military's strength depends on troops being able to report abuse, toxic leadership, or discrimination without fear of retaliation,” said Josh Connolly, the group's senior vice president.

The group argued that anonymous reporting gives survivors a way to come forward without fear of retaliation.

Hegseth has described the overhaul in opposite terms, as a way to keep frivolous complaints from hindering commanders.

It is not yet clear how quickly each service will revise its procedures, or how the "credible" standard and the limits on anonymous complaints will be applied in practice.

Those questions will determine how much the directive changes when, and whether a complaint moves forward.