Trump demands Supreme Court unblock access to ‘error-prone’ federal voter database including Social Security and citizenship data

President Donald Trump is asking the Supreme Court to restore access to an immigration voter database with just weeks until the midterm elections. 

It is the latest in a flurry of election related cases Trump has punted to the high court for last-minute intervention.

Solicitor General John Sauer asked the justices to halt a lower court’s June ruling that blocked the Trump administration’s access to the DHS database – dubbed the ‘Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements,’ or SAVE – used to verify individuals immigration status.

Sauer assailed the lower court’s ruling as ‘indefensible’ and one that threatened the security of the looming midterm elections, which are now less than 60 days away.

Critics blasted the latest appeal by the Trump administration as yet another bid by Trump to shore up federal control over the voting process – which has long been run by individual states – and to disenfranchise voters ahead of the November midterms.

A group of advocacy groups sued earlier this year to block Trump’s use of the SAVE database, arguing that the system was error-prone and outdated – resulting in the erroneous identification of noncitizens, who were then removed from the rolls.

The lower court judge, US District Judge Sparkle Sooknanan, sided with plaintiffs in June, ruling that the system in question ‘trampled on the privacy rights of American citizens’ and threatened to disenfranchise eligible voters.

The US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit also ruled 2-1 to uphold Sooknanan’s ruling earlier this month, prompting Sauer to file the emergency petition to the Supreme Court for review.

Demonstrators appear at a ‘Defend the Vote’ rally in Washington, DC. Trump has sought to crack down on mail-in voting, part of a broader effort to exert more federal control in elections 

A voter drops off a ballot in Washington, DC. Trump is urging the high court to halt a lower court order blocking his new restrictions on mail-in voting before the November midterms 

The new Supreme Court appeal comes as Trump continues to cite concerns of voter fraud and election security, despite scant evidence that either exists, and certainly not on a meaningful scale.

 Critics argue the attempt is merely the latest bid by Trump and some in the GOP to disenfranchise voters who could Democrats regain control of the House or Senate majorities this fall.

‘Court after court has rejected the Trump-Vance administration’s effort to revive an unlawful system that puts Americans’ privacy and fundamental freedom to vote at risk,’ Skye Perryman, president and CEO of ​the advocacy group Democracy Forward, said in a statement.

‘Now, after failing to get its way in the lower courts, the administration is asking the US Supreme Court to intervene, despite the law being clear that [the Department of Homeland Security’s] actions cannot continue,’ Perryman said.

Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, who oversees emergency appeals emanating from the DC US Court of Appeals, gave parties one week to file motions to the high court in its consideration of the case.