Trump's Voter-Roll Purge Got Vaporized. The Judges Weren't Done Yet.
Four losses this week, and the throughline is due process, read literally — by federal judges, including one Trump hand-picked himself. Pour something cold; the paperwork alone reads like a eulogy.
1. A Federal Judge Just Vacated Trump's Entire Nationwide Voter-Roll Purge
U.S. District Judge Sparkle Sooknanan struck down, in full, on October 9 the Justice Department's nationwide "Voter List Maintenance Policy" — the program that demanded unredacted voter rolls from 49 states and D.C., ran them through a federal citizenship database, and pressured states to purge anyone it flagged within 45 days. Reuters reports Sooknanan found DOJ never had the statutory authority it claimed and brushed aside real evidence that its own database could misclassify citizens as noncitizens. She had one word for DOJ's theory that ordinary registered voters could be treated as fraud "subjects": "nonsensical." The ruling noted at least 25 other federal courts had already dismissed pieces of this same campaign and one appeals court had upheld a dismissal — Friday's order just took out the whole policy at once.
DOJ built a nationwide suspect list out of people who did nothing but register to vote. It took one judge one word — nonsensical — to flush the entire thing.
2. Trump's Own Judge Just Ordered DHS to Bring Back the Man It Dumped in a Country He's Never Been To
A federal judge Trump himself appointed, John C. Hinderaker, ruled that DHS violated Ahmed Soliman's due process rights by deporting him in April to Equatorial Guinea — a country Soliman has no ties to at all — and ordered the department to arrange his release and return. Soliman, a 31-year-old Phoenix man who fled Egypt as a child and had been granted protection against removal there over fears of anti-gay persecution, has since been jailed, held at gunpoint, and had his phone repeatedly seized for talking to reporters about conditions at the hotel-turned-detention-site where he's held. By Thursday, NPR reported the administration was scrambling to actually comply and reverse the deportation.
Even the judge Trump personally picked took one look at this deal and said no. When your own hires start reading the Constitution back to you, maybe it's time to stop outsourcing due process to whichever country cashes the check.
3. RNC Sued Georgia Over How Voters Hand In Ballots. A Judge Read the Statute Out Loud.
Gwinnett County Superior Court Judge Warren Davis dismissed the RNC's lawsuit trying to block Georgia's second-largest county from letting voters hand mail ballots directly to trained election officials at early-voting sites without drop boxes. Davis ruled flatly that "the Georgia Election Code expressly authorizes" the exact policy Republicans sued over and that "plaintiffs' claims fail as a matter of law," rejecting the argument that a staffed registrar's desk is secretly an illegal drop box. It's the second Republican ballot-return suit a Georgia court has thrown out within a week, after a similar Fulton County case was dismissed days earlier.
Two counties, two lawsuits, zero wins — and the losing argument both times was 'what if a human being counts as a drop box.'
4. Trump's Approval Rating Found a New Way to Hit Its Own Record Low: Doing It Twice
A new Reuters/Ipsos poll released October 5 put Trump's approval at 32% — tying the career-low he'd just set the month before, and matching the worst number of either of his terms. USA Today reports his previous floor was 33%, a mark he'd held in December 2017 and again this past August, and that support among Hispanic voters — who backed him at nearly 50% in 2024 — has collapsed to just 24%.
He spent a career promising to break records. Nobody said which ones.
Now go back to doomscrolling. You've earned five minutes of not-doom.