Rhode Island voter-data suit dismissed by federal judge

A federal judge in Rhode Island dismissed the Trump administration's lawsuit seeking unredacted voter rolls and detailed voter data, ruling that federal law does not authorize such a request as a "fishing expedition." U.S. District Court Judge Mary McElroy sided with Rhode Island election officials and civil rights advocates who argued the demand violated privacy laws and could be used to check citizenship status. The DOJ had contended that access to the data was needed for election security, but officials maintained the data requests were overly broad and intrusive. The ruling aligns with similar denials of broad data demands in other federal cases relating to election administration, signaling judicial limits on federal data collection in this area.