WA, Oregon sue over Trump’s exec order on mail-in voting: ‘We don’t want to go backward’
.png "Attorney General Nick Brown announced a new lawsuit against the Trump administration on Friday, April 4.")
For state Rep. Sharlett Mena, the fight for voting rights is a personal one. The daughter of Mexican immigrants, she remembers growing up in the majority-Latino city of Pasco and not seeing elected officials who looked like her.
Pasco would eventually start to see changes in representation following a federal Voting Rights Act case, Mena said at a Friday press conference.
But an executive order from President Trump could threaten such progress, the Tacoma Democrat said.
“That’s what it’s intended to do,” said Mena, who chairs the House State Government and Tribal Relations Committee. “It’s intended to silence voices and make people feel invisible.”
On April 4, Mena joined Attorney General Nick Brown in announcing a new lawsuit against the Trump administration. Washington has teamed up with Oregon to file the legal challenge over Trump’s executive order targeting election rules, which especially takes aim at requirements for mail-in voting and proof of citizenship.
The lawsuit argues that the order’s citizenship requirements are burdensome and illegal, and that they’ll disenfranchise voters. More than 9% of voting-age U.S. citizens don’t have the required documents readily on hand, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.
Washington and Oregon are among 18 states that accept ballots postmarked before or on Election Day.
Trump has blasted mail-in voting for years and claimed that the 2020 presidential election was “rigged” against him. His executive order would require that, for mail-in ballots to be counted, they must arrive no later than Election Day.
From women’s suffrage to Washington’s Voting Rights Act of 2018, people have long fought for their vote to count and matter, Mena told McClatchy on Friday afternoon. Trump’s executive order seeks to preempt the states’ policies passed through the Legislature, she said, including automatic voter registration and mail-in voting.
“We’re seeing a pretty concerted effort to suppress the vote, and we don’t want to go backward in Washington,” Mena said, adding that lawmakers have been working this session to make voting even more accessible than it is today.
‘Disdain for the Constitution’
Washington’s lawsuit with Oregon claims that Trump’s executive order is unlawful and “harms States by purporting to override our sovereign laws governing the counting of votes and voter registration, imposing substantial costs on States to change state voting systems and laws, and disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of State residents.”
The suit aims to declare the majority of the order’s provisions unconstitutional. It also wants to stop the federal government from enforcing or implementing them.
Reached for comment, the White House railed against news of the legal challenge.
“The Democrats continue to show their disdain for the Constitution and it continues to show in their insane objections to the President’s commonsense executive actions to require proof of U.S. citizenship in an effort to protect the integrity of American elections,” said spokesman Harrison Fields. “The Trump administration is standing up for free, fair, and honest elections and asking this basic question is essential to our Constitutional Republic.”
Mena called that statement “laughable,” adding that Trump also has suggested running for a third term, contrary to what the Constitution says.
“I don’t think there’s any respect for the Constitution coming from this administration,” she said. “We have a right as states in the Constitution to set the time, places and manner for elections.”
Brown’s office noted that Washington Republicans such as the late former Secretary of State Ralph Munro have championed vote-by-mail. Supporters say that such systems are popular among voters because they boost access to democracy.
In addition to making it harder to vote, Brown said Friday that Trump’s order “erodes public confidence in our elections.”
Fighting hard for voting rights
Washington Secretary of State Steve Hobbs said at Friday’s press conference that Trump’s mail-in-voting changes would disproportionately hurt underserved and rural communities. Last year alone, county election officials received more than 300,000 ballots after Election Day.
Requiring evidence of citizenship to register to vote would harm eligible voters such as low-income folks, seniors and naturalized citizens, Hobbs said. Federal law already bars non-citizens from voting.
“The idea of handing over voter rolls for review to the Department of Homeland Security and DOGE — essentially handing over our voter rolls to a billionaire, a group with no election experience and a track record for errors — is foolhardy and ridiculous,” he said.
Washington has led or participated in several other lawsuits against Trump since he took office in January, including challenging an executive order seeking to end birthright citizenship for people born in the U.S. to non-citizen parents.
On April 3, 19 other states filed a similar lawsuit challenging Trump’s voting-related executive order. Brown said Washington wanted to bring its own case because of how the order would affect this state uniquely.
Mena told McClatchy that communities across the state, from Pasco to Yakima, have fought hard for their voting rights.
“The progress that we’ve made is not just legislative action or elected leaders; it’s been made by communities themselves,” Mena said. “We want to stand with community to make sure that we keep the progress that we have made and continue to move forward.”
This story was originally published April 4, 2025 at 4:50 PM.
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