‘If they’re honest’: Trump casts latest suspicion on US midterm elections

What the report says

US President Donald Trump said he would accept next week’s midterm election results if they were “honest,” while his administration widened legal and administrative pressure on several Democrat-led states over election procedures. The remarks were made on Tuesday, according to Al Jazeera, ahead of the November 3 vote that could affect control of Congress.

The article says the Department of Justice has recently sent demands or taken legal steps involving Washington, California and Alaska. In Washington state, the DOJ threatened action unless officials removed about 400 people it said were not US citizens from voter rolls. State officials rejected the suggestion that the election was insecure and said some of the names appeared to be tied to outdated records. California also received a DOJ letter about roughly 20,000 names, while officials there said many of the listed people appeared to have been born in the United States.

Al Jazeera reports that the DOJ has also sued Alaska over a Senate race, saying it could seek to block certification if Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan did not win, because another candidate on the ballot had the same name. Trump said he personally directed that case. The administration has also said it plans to send a record number of election observers, despite objections from some state officials.

The developments matter because they come as Trump and his Justice Department continue to question election integrity in states likely to be pivotal in the midterms, heightening tension over how the vote will be administered and certified.