Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) said Friday that President Donald Trump will keep making “continuing efforts” to “try to rig this election,” pointing to a Supreme Court ruling allowing the administration to use a federal database tied to citizenship status.
Speaking on CNN’s “The Arena,” Van Hollen was asked by host Kasie Hunt about the implications of the ruling, which lets the administration access the database but appears to limit its broad use for the midterm elections while leaving open the possibility of targeted use.
Van Hollen said there are two separate concerns. “One is the threat to privacy of sensitive information on every American’s Social Security numbers and other things. And that’s why this database has not been allowed to be expanded in that way,” he said.
The second concern, he said, is that the database could mistakenly be used to keep eligible voters from the polls. “The concern is that it will be used to exclude American citizens from voting, because the database is, you know, not perfect. And we don’t want this database to be used to prevent American citizens from voting,” Van Hollen said.
“Now, maybe in this coming election it won’t be as big a problem. But the fact that Donald Trump wants to do this is a continuing threat to our democracy and the right of American citizens to vote.”
Van Hollen tied the database dispute to other recent fights, including the SAVE Act, which he said Senate Democrats blocked, and an earlier effort by Trump to prevent the Postal Service from delivering mail-in ballots, which he said courts struck down.
“And we should be worried about all of Donald Trump’s shenanigans,” Van Hollen said. “But we can expect continuing efforts by Donald Trump to try to rig this election.”
