Andrew Gillies
WASHINGTON D.C. (KEYT) – On Wednesday, nine Senators wrote a letter condemning the appointment of former ‘Stop the Steal’ attorney Kurt Olsen to investigate the 2020 election and warned that the White House may use the investigation to declare a national emergency and make sweeping changes to elections nationwide.
The letter, signed by California’s Senators and seven other members of the upper chamber, was addressed directly to the White House Chief of Staff Susan Wiles and White House Counsel David Warrington.
“While the 2020 election was nearly five years ago, Mr. Olsen’s appointment appears to be part of a scheme to convince the President to attempt a national emergency declaration to illegally claim unconstitutional federal powers over state and local election administration,” opened Wednesday’s letter from legislators. “Any such declaration would quickly fail to withstand legal scrutiny, but it would still represent a completely unacceptable attempt to undermine the U.S. Constitution and free and fair elections in this country.”
The letter asks that the White House legal officials ensure the investigation does not violate legal and ethical standards nor undermine future elections nationwide.
Olsen played a prominent role in attempts to stop the certification of results of the 2020 election in four battleground states and, according to reporting by The New York Times, recently encouraged the President to make public claims and legal demands for voting machine data from Arizona, Wisconsin, and Georgia.
The Senators noted in Wednesday’s letter that The New York Times also reported that Deputy Assistant Secretary for Election Integrity at the Department of Homeland Security Heather Honey pushed for the Trump Administration to declare a national emergency to exercise, “some additional powers that don’t exist right now” to take, “these other steps without Congress and we can mandate that states do things and so on”.
Article I Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution assigns the authority to determine the times, places, and manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives to respective state legislatures while empowering the federal legislature to pass laws that may alter those regulations.
The Office of President of the United States is not mentioned in the clause.
Olsen has also made claims that voting machines were not properly secured during the 2020 election and media outlets that repeated similar claims have had to pay out hundreds of millions of dollars to settle defamation claims detailed Wednesday’s letter.
“The November 3rd election was the most secure in American history,” read a joint statement from federal elections security groups and private organizations focused on elections security on Nov. 12, 2020. “All of the states with close results in the 2020 presidential race have paper records of each vote, allowing the ability to go back and count each ballot if necessary. This is an added benefit for security and resilience. This process allows for the identification and correction of any mistakes or errors. There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised.”
The Director of Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Christopher Krebs during President Trump’s first term and signatory of the above joint statement regarding the 2020 Election, was fired days after the statement was issued.
“Chris Krebs did a really good job, as state election officials all across the nation will tell you, and he obviously should not be fired,” stated Republican Senator Ben Sasse of Nebraska in November of 2020.
In March, the Trump Administration issued Executive Order 14248-Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections which, among other changes to voting, ordered the Election Assistance Commission to, “rescind all previous certifications of voting equipment based on prior standards.”
Earlier this month, Senator Padilla joined Senator Gary Peters in filing an amicus brief supporting a lawsuit aiming to halt the Trump Administration’s demands for state voting information to create a national database that can be used by state’s to purge voters while also explicitly tying election security funding to compliance with the demands.
Last week, the Department of Justice announced that it was sending election monitors to five counties in California to observe voting during the 2025 Special Election that features a single item, Proposition 50, which could have significant impact on federal representation in the next election cycle.
“This [Department of Justice election observation] initiative is aimed at promoting transparency and an open flow of communication between poll observers and election monitors to ensure that elections proceed with a high degree of security,” argued the Department of Justice while announcing the election observers on Oct. 24. “From now and up to Election Day, Civil Rights Division personnel will be available to receive questions and complaints from the public related to possible violations of federal voting rights laws.”
The announcement from the U.S. Department of Justice shared that requests for election monitoring in a particular jurisdiction can be sent to VEM@usdoj.gov for review.
Voting in the 2025 California Special Election is already underway and some local counties asked that voters send their mailed ballots as soon as possible to ensure they are counted while other counties have set up Voting Centers that provide expansive assistance to voters looking to properly cast their ballots.
“[A]ny attempt to declare a national emergency to interfere in state and local election administration would be illegal and unconstitutional,” concluded Wednesday’s letter. “While we are confident any such scheme would fail quickly in the face of judicial scrutiny, it still poses unacceptable risks of undermining future elections in this country.”
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