The Justice Department’s quest to force states to turn over voter rolls has faltered in Washington state, where federal government lawyers seem to have forgotten to actually serve their lawsuit on state officials.
A magistrate judge finally told the government to explain its failure or else the case would be closed.
The department then said it had belatedly served notice on the state — but didn’t explain the delay.
And the state said the feds still bungled things, apparently serving the official notice of the lawsuit on someone who wasn’t even authorized to accept service on behalf of Secretary of State Steve Hobbs, the named defendant.
Magistrate Judge S. Kate Vaughan was not pleased with the developments, and demanded to know just what was going on. She said the Justice Department “failed to comply” with her order to explain the missed deadline, and wondered if government lawyers “made an inaccurate representation to this court.”
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“It is now clear that plaintiff did not timely serve defendant. It remains unclear whether service of process on defendant has actually been effected and how,” she said.
The Justice Department declined to comment.
Washington is one of nearly 30 lawsuits that the Justice Department has filed trying to pry loose voter registration records from states. It’s not been going well so far, with the three judges who have ruled on the matter siding with the states and against the administration.
