Alex Padilla U.S. Senator for California

Padilla: “Instead of running on a record of clawing away health care coverage to pay for tax cuts for billionaires, they’re trying to rig the rules of the game.”

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, U.S. Senators Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration and California’s former Secretary of State, and Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, convened a Rules and Judiciary Committee Democrats spotlight forum titled “Protecting the Future of American Democracy: Fighting a Surge in Voter Suppression.”

Padilla’s remarks at the forum focused on recent trends in disturbing voter suppression tactics, including:

• The Trump Administration’s efforts to pressure Texas and other states to undertake mid-decade racial redistricting for partisan political purposes;
• The six-month long effort to overturn the election for the State Supreme Court in North Carolina by the targeted disenfranchisement of eligible voters after they cast their ballots, including military voters serving our country overseas; and
• The change in mission of the DOJ Civil Rights Division’s Voting Section to focus on unsubstantiated voter fraud claims, and the DOJ’s demands for multiple states’ sensitive voter information.

During the forum, Padilla uncovered recently received DOJ requests to Los Angeles, San Diego, and San Francisco for their voter data, setting up a potential purge of voter rolls.

Padilla also shed light on potential violations of the Hatch Act committed by senior Trump Administration political appointees regarding their partisan redistricting efforts in Texas. He highlighted his letter to the independent Office of Special Counsel requesting an investigation into senior Trump Administration officials for any role they are playing in carrying out the president’s partisan scheme to racially gerrymander Texas and other states, calling it “a clear violation of the Hatch Act.”

Democratic Senators heard from former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, North Carolina Supreme Court Associate Justice Allison Riggs, LMU Loyola Law School Professor Justin Levitt, and Vet Voice Foundation Chief Executive Officer Janessa Goldbeck on systematic attacks on the right to vote.

Key excerpts from Senator Padilla’s opening remarks are included below:

Key Excerpts

• “Today, just one week ahead of the 60th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, we’re witnessing a disturbing trend, a coordinated campaign frankly, of voter suppression led by the Trump Administration. Their goal is to amplify their false narrative of insecure elections, to justify their power grabs and to make it harder to register to vote, to stay on the rolls, and to actually cast your ballot.”

• “What started with the Trump Executive Order on Election Integrity and the Republicans’ SAVE Act has now moved on to the wholesale weaponization of the Department of Justice: The Department of Justice’s Voting Section has reversed their mission statement to drop voting rights protection and prioritize alleged voter fraud. And now, all across the country, the Department of Justice is demanding that states turn over voter rolls — not just a list of names, but a lot of sensitive, private, and confidential information for folks that are registered to vote.”

• “The last few months, Trump and his Republican allies have seen the thin margins in the House and can feel the political winds shifting. Instead of running on a record of clawing away health care coverage to pay for tax cuts for billionaires, they’re trying to rig the rules of the game. From the South Lawn of the White House, Donald Trump has directed the Department of Justice and state officials to redraw congressional maps in Republicans’ favor.”

• “The Trump Administration is not focused on protecting your right to vote. They’re focused on denying it.”

• “Colleagues, if we want to defend the future of American democracy, we can’t afford to wait until election season rolls around to act. We’ve got to raise the alarm today by shining a spotlight on the shocking voter suppression efforts coming out of the White House.”

Senator Padilla has led the charge in fighting back against the Trump Administration’s unprecedented efforts to suppress the right to vote. Earlier this month, Padilla, Durbin, and Senator Peter Welch (D-Vt.) led 13 Senators in raising the alarm on the DOJ Civil Rights Division’s policy shift to focus on unsubstantiated voter fraud investigations. Padilla and Senators Gary Peters (D-Mich.) and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) also recently expressed serious concerns that recent changes to and the expanded use of the insufficiently tested Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) program could purge eligible citizens from state voter rolls. Previously, Padilla led 11 Senators in introducing the Defending America’s Future Elections Act to repeal Trump’s illegal anti-voter executive order and prevent the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) from accessing sensitive voter registration data and state records. He also led 14 Democratic Senators in calling on Trump to revoke his illegal anti-voter executive order and issued a statement slamming the order when it was announced.

This spotlight forum is the second in a series of Rules Committee Democrats’ forums focused on protecting the future of America’s elections.

The series continues to underscore the dangers of the Trump Administration’s unprecedented attacks on election security, integrity, and funding required to smoothly administer elections and protect American democracy. The first spotlight forum in May focused on Congressional Republicans’ Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act and Trump’s illegal anti-voter executive order, both of which threaten to disenfranchise millions of eligible American citizens.

Padilla’s full remarks, as delivered, are available below:

Good afternoon and thank you all for being here for today’s spotlight forum on “Protecting the Future of American Democracy: Fighting a Surge in Voter Suppression.”

I’m Senator Alex Padilla, Ranking Member of the Rules and Administration Committee here in the Senate. Joined by my colleage, Senator Dick Durbin, Ranking Member of the Judiciary Committee. I’m still getting used to that. I’m used to just calling you Chairman. I was spoiled for the prior four years.

And just one quick word of housekeeping as we set the stage for the hearing, our Senate Democratic Caucus lunch is a few minutes from adjourning, so you’ll see an influx of members during either our opening statements or your opening statements. There’s a lot of interest in the conversation today, one that the majority has no interest in holding at the subcommittee level or at the committee level in either of our committees. But the issues are important to make sure we shed light on them. So looking forward to your testimony, the question, answer, discussion portion of it, and a lot of engagement from our colleagues.

Today, just one week ahead of the 60th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, we’re witnessing a disturbing trend, a coordinated campaign frankly, of voter suppression led by the Trump Administration.

Their goal is to amplify their false narrative of insecure elections, to justify their power grabs and to make it harder to register to vote, to stay on the rolls, and to actually cast your ballot.

What started with the Trump Executive Order on Election Integrity and the Republicans’ SAVE Act has now moved on to the wholesale weaponization of the Department of Justice:

The Department of Justice’s Voting Section has reversed their mission statement to drop voting rights protection and prioritize alleged voter fraud.

And now, all across the country, the Department of Justice is demanding that states turn over voter rolls — not just a list of names, but a lot of sensitive, private, and confidential information for folks that are registered to vote.

In fact, this month, Los Angeles, San Diego, and San Francisco, counties, local jurisdictions, were also hit with those requests — a move that looks a lot like they’re laying the groundwork for mass voter purges.

Their actions are also helping to embolden election deniers outside of the federal government.

Just look to this past November, when even after leading her opponent by over 700 votes and winning two separate recounts, North Carolina Supreme Court Justice candidate Allison Riggs was forced to defend her victory in court for six months before taking office.

Now, taking a page from Trump’s playbook, her Republican challenger sought to undo the votes of over 65,000 North Carolinians — many of which were cast by military voters serving overseas.

Today, even after Justice Riggs has taken her seat, the Trump Administration has now taken up the cause and sued North Carolina, threatening to disenfranchise around 100,000 previously registered voters.

But the last few months, Trump and his Republican allies have seen the thin margins in the House and can feel the political winds shifting.

Instead of running on a record of clawing away health care coverage to pay for tax cuts for billionaires, they’re trying to rig the rules of the game.

From the South Lawn of the White House, Donald Trump has directed the Department of Justice and state officials to redraw congressional maps in Republicans’ favor.

Earlier today, I wrote to the Office of Special Counsel requesting an investigation into senior officials for any role they are playing in carrying out the president’s partisan scheme.

It’s a clear violation of the Hatch Act in my view.

So no, the Trump Administration is not focused on protecting your right to vote. They’re focused on denying it.

Colleagues, if we want to defend the future of American democracy, we can’t afford to wait until election season rolls around to act.

We’ve got to raise the alarm today by shining a spotlight on the shocking voter suppression efforts coming out of the White House.

And for that reason, I’m looking forward to hearing more about each of our witnesses’ experiences.

With that, let me recognize Senator Dick Durbin.

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