can they do that? I thought federal officials superseded state ones?
Federal law supercedes state law. That doesn't mean federal officials can go where they want.
IIRC, the issue is that the Voting Rights Act gave DoJ the power to observe elections, but the SCOTUS partially nuked the VRA. So now it's not clear whether the DoJ still has that power, and the usual suspects are taking advantage of this ambiguity. Possibly hoping to give the SCOTUS a chance to nuke more of the VRA.
The judge hasn't ruled yet on whether Musk broke the law. He simply declined to issue a preliminary injunction.
A preliminary injunction tells someone to stop what they are doing while the court case plays out. In order to get a preliminary injunction, you have to convince a judge that there will be irreparable harm by letting someone continue.
In other words, a judge might rule against an injunction but nevertheless end up ruling against the defendant. Especially if the judge thinks the harm has already been done.
No, you didn't see this poll predicting Hillary crushing Iowa.
The Selzer poll is one of the best, it only looks at Iowa, and in 2016 it was one of the few that said Trump was doing much better than everyone expected.
In 2020 it said Biden was doing better than Clinton, but Trump was nevertheless doing better than expected.
In both cases, it was spot on. And this year, it says Trump is doing far worse than everyone thinks.
But this article is not about a poll. They are looking publicly available PA voting records. They look like this:
Doe, John: voted in 2024, 2020
Doe, Jane: voted in 2024
PA isn't going to cross-reference their database with other states. So there is no good way to tell if Jane Doe is a first time voter or just a recent move. Either way, she is a new voter.
When the votes are counted, the presiding officer will be VP Kamala Harris, not the House Speaker.
And the only way to block a state's certification is if both the House and Senate agree. Otherwise they have to accept the results certified by the governor.
A 10 day weather forecast typically includes a graph with a y-axis break. It is meant for the general public, and most people have no difficulty interpreting it.
Voter registration in VA has required the voter's SSN (if they have one) since 1971. It's actually written into the VA Constitution!
Driver's licenses have required the driver's SSN (if they have one) since 1968
Citizenship is on drivers license applications because of the Real ID Act, passed by Congress in 2005
So I don't think you can blame the current crop of MAGA idiots for collecting this information. I don't even necessarily blame anyone for trying to combine the datasets.
However, doing so less than 90 days before an election is absolutely unacceptable.