This story was originally produced by the Concord Monitor. NHPR is republishing it in partnership with the Granite State News Collaborative.
The U.S. Department of Justice will send election monitors to polling places in New Hampshire’s largest cities during the state primary on Sept. 8.
Manchester and Nashua are two of 15 jurisdictions across six states selected by the Trump administration for what Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon called “nonpartisan election monitoring.”
Dhillon, who heads up the DOJ’s civil rights division, said in a video posted to X last week that the monitors will keep an eye on polling places to make sure they’re accessible and properly open during the allotted hours.
“This is an important goal that increases voter confidence,” Dhillon said, “and it’s also important to make sure that our voting is accurate so that every citizen who votes has their vote counted equally without having their vote canceled out by somebody who shouldn’t be voting.”
The federal government, under administrations led by both parties, has sent monitors to polls before. It is typically a routine practice meant to ensure compliance with federal voting rights laws.
Dhillon’s announcement came days after a judge dismissed the Trump administration’s bid to access New Hampshire’s confidential voter files, which Secretary of State David Scanlan had refused to turn over.
Scanlan and other election officials nationwide also received letters from the Trump administration last week warning they could be criminally charged for allowing non-U.S. citizens to vote.
Scanlan has not said much publicly about the election monitors.
“Everyone is welcome to observe our elections, including representatives of the federal government,” he said in a statement. His office said Manchester and Nashua received letters from the federal government informing them of the monitors.
The other states on the list are Arizona, Michigan, Massachusetts, Minnesota and Virginia. All except New Hampshire have Democratic governors.
Manchester and Nashua are not only New Hampshire’s largest population centers but home to some of the state’s largest immigrant populations.
Voters there also lean heavily Democratic. While the state overall produced a narrow split between President Donald Trump and Kamala Harris in the 2024 election, Harris held wider leads in both cities.
