President Trump's team is prioritizing the establishment of a vast network of election integrity lawyers and poll watchers over organizing traditional voter outreach efforts like door-knocking and grassroots campaigning.
The Republican National Committee (RNC), under Trump's influence, is creating a robust network of lawyers and volunteers to prepare for potential lawsuits involving the 2024 election.
An RNC official told Axios that the committee plans to allocate more resources to this operation than to any other department. The RNC has appointed 13 election integrity state directors, who have been conducting training sessions with state and county GOP parties in key swing states such as Pennsylvania, Arizona, and Wisconsin. The RNC has also engaged 13 in-state counsels to help identify local litigation opportunities.
The Trump campaign and the RNC also aim to recruit and deploy 100,000 volunteers, including law students and lawyers, to serve as poll watchers and observers. The RNC, in collaboration with state Republican parties and groups like Stephen Miller's America First Legal, has already filed numerous election-related lawsuits in 25 states.
Several of these lawsuits aim to prevent states from counting mail-in ballots that lack a date or are received after Election Day. Other suits challenge the accuracy of voter registration lists, the prevention of noncitizen voting, and the enforcement of stricter voter ID rules. The Republicans have already secured a few victories, including a New York case that struck down a law allowing noncitizens to vote in local elections and a Pennsylvania case ruling that undated mail-in ballots should not be counted.
Wisconsin, a pivotal election state, has seen significant legal activity. Mike Hoffman, the RNC's Wisconsin director for the election integrity unit, mentioned deploying specific attorneys for Milwaukee and roaming attorneys for Racine and Kenosha during a training call with 50 conservative activists, as reported by the New York Times.
Republicans have also filed complaints against election officials in Milwaukee and Madison, both heavily Democratic cities, as well as against the Wisconsin Elections Commission. These complaints allege that Republicans were denied poll worker positions during the state's April primary election.
