Michigan Republicans Prevail in Election Integrity Lawsuit Over Number of Poll Workers

Poll workers board up windows of the ballot counting area at the TCF Center in Detroit on Nov. 4, 2020. Seth Herald/AFP via Getty Images

Michigan Republican officials have secured a win in an election integrity lawsuit against the city of Detroit over “its deliberate failure” to hire enough Republican election inspectors.

The Republican National Committee (RNC), the Michigan GOP, and the Wayne County Republican committee chairs announced that the city had agreed to modify its election protocols to hire “at least one Republican poll worker in each location,” in a settlement of the lawsuit.

In August, the RNC and other entities sued the city, alleging that it violated a state law that requires election officials to hire an equal number of poll workers on both sides of the political aisle.

The city, the lawsuit alleges, hired seven times as many Democrats as Republicans, which the RNC said decreases public trust in elections.

According to the complaint, the Republican Party nominated 675 election inspectors; however, the city only appointed 52 of them for the primary election.

The city hired up to 250 Republicans who were not nominated by the RNC, leaving a ratio of seven Democrats to one Republican inspector, which the RNC said was “not even close to equal.”

In comparison, the city hired more than 2,300 election inspectors from the Democratic Party.

“This uneven distribution of poll workers not only breaches state law but also undermines the integrity and fairness of the electoral process,” the RNC said in an August press release. “Our lawsuit demands that Detroit appoint more Republican inspectors.”

In response to The Epoch Times’ request for comment, the City of Detroit’s corporation counsel, Conrad Mallett, said: “The modest extra steps we agreed to take were not complicated and not required by law. They were put in place as part of a continuing effort to ensure our citizens respect and have confidence in our election process and to demonstrate that our city clerk listens to all concerns.”

RNC Chairman Michael Whatley said the win will return “much-needed transparency and accountability” to the city’s election protocols.

“Thanks to the efforts of the RNC and Michigan GOP, Detroit will now change its election processes so that Republican poll workers will be allocated to all voting locations and, as nearly as possible, an equal number of Republicans will be hired this November,” Whatley said.

The RNC’s Michigan lawsuits are part of a larger legal battle for election integrity in the state.

In July, the RNC won a lawsuit to protect signature verification requirements that election officials had been instructed to disregard.

“The signatures of absentee ballot voters have to and should be verified—it’s common sense,” state Republican Party Chairman Pete Hoekstra said in a statement. “Michigan is crucial to the pathway to victory in November. We must protect and enforce all our election laws to maintain confidence in our system.”

In March, the RNC filed a lawsuit alleging that state election officials are violating federal law by not maintaining voter registration records.

“Election integrity starts with clean voter rolls, and that’s why the National Voter Registration Act requires state officials to keep their rolls accurate and up-to-date,” Hoekstra said.