The federal judiciary in the USA opposed the plan prepared by the President Donald Trump administration on the grounds of preventing non-citizens from voting.
Those who opposed this plan, which Washington argued would prevent non-citizens from voting, stated that the practice risked depriving eligible voters of their right to vote and violating states' authority over elections.
US District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who was appointed under former Democratic President Barack Obama and serves in the capital Washington, banned the Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security from sending voter lists to the states.
Under the decision, federal agencies will not be able to forward to states lists of registered voters who the administration claims may not be US citizens.
They also won't be able to require state election officials to separate those voters' ballots or not count them until citizenship is proven.
According to the Reuters news agency, Judge Chutkan pointed out that the data held by the administration may not be reliable and noted that there is a risk of legally registered voters being deprived of their right to vote.
This decision was the latest round of judicial obstacles against President Trump's efforts to establish federal control over the election administration ahead of today's midterm elections, in which Republicans are struggling to maintain the majority in both houses of Congress.
In the United States, states are responsible for administering elections.
Not only is it illegal for non-citizens to vote in the country, but all available evidence suggests that this is extremely rare.
On the other hand, Trump, who baselessly claimed that his defeat in the 2020 presidential election was due to fraud, has long accused states of making it easier for non-citizens to vote.
The Trump administration has stepped up its pressure campaign against election officials over the past month over allegations of non-citizen voting.
In this context, letters were sent to officials in California and Washington states, requesting that no ballots belonging to people on the lists that the administration claimed might not be citizens be counted.
Acting on this step by the administration, groups advocating voting rights and privacy appealed to Judge Chutkan and requested that the sending of the lists in question to the states and making such requests be temporarily blocked.
The plaintiffs argued that the Trump administration violated the Privacy Act of 1974, which restricts the federal government's ability to disclose sensitive personal information.
On the other hand, the Ministry of Justice defended the letters sent to the states of California and Washington in the file submitted to the court on Saturday.
The department argued that the letters were part of an effort to enforce federal law banning noncitizens from voting and did not constitute a separate policy subject to federal court review.
The Trump administration's demands regarding the election process were rejected by other federal judges and appeals courts last week.
Earlier this week, a federal judge in Los Angeles denied the Justice Department's California request. The ministry had requested that the state be instructed to temporarily set aside the ballots sent by mail from more than 20 thousand registered voters, who it claimed were likely not US citizens.
An appeals court on Friday last week rejected the ministry's request for an emergency stay until the appeal process is concluded.
Also Friday, a federal judge in San Francisco ordered the Justice Department to stop threatening to prosecute state and local election officials who do not comply with Trump administration demands regarding alleged non-citizen voting.
