For the second time in less than a year, a federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to turn documents related to the work of an advisory commission on election integrity over to Maine Secretary of State Matt Dunlap.
The commission disbanded in January, shortly after Dunlap filed suit. As a commission appointee, Dunlap said he was denied access to crucial information, including state voting data. A federal judge has now ordered defendants to produce relevant documents by July 18.
"When this judge granted us the preliminary injunction back in December, at least we knew they couldn't operate in the dark, that they were gonna have to share this information,” says Dunlap. “And then they basically have done nothing but ignore that injunction ever since then. And so now the judge, in coming down in favor of my lawsuit, has said basically they don't have a choice. They have to follow the law. And that's all they have to do, they have to follow the law."
The judge rejected the commission's contention that Dunlap, a Democrat, is no longer entitled to the documents now that the commission has been disbanded.
Dunlap says he all he ever wanted were the facts.
"We were operating on allegations and rumors, rather than trying to track down actual facts about misconduct in elections which is part of what we wanted to talk about,” says Dunlap. “We wanted to talk about what is actual misconduct, and how does it impact the integrity of an elections process, and we never got there. We were too busy chasing ghosts around the White House.”
The commission was originally convened to investigate Republican President Donald Trump's unsubstantiated claims that as many as five million illegally cast ballots cost him the popular vote.
