Lawsuit accusing Trump of disenfranchising Black voters in 2020 reassigned to Judge Tanya Chutkan

A lawsuit claiming that Donald Trump, his campaign and the Republican National Committee attempted to disenfranchise Black voters during the 2020 election has been reassigned to Judge Tanya Chutkan, the same U.S. District Court judge presiding over the former president’s federal election interference case in Washington, D.C. The suit, brought by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, accuses the Trump campaign and the RNC of violating the Voting Rights Act in their efforts to overturn his electoral defeat. 

According to Democracy Docket, the civil case was reassigned to Chutkan earlier this month on Oct. 6. “On Nov. 28, 2022, a trial court issued an order that allowed the plaintiffs to amend their complaint and held that Trump is not absolutely immune,” Democracy Docket said in a release following the announcement of the case. “Trump appealed the Nov. 28 order to the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Litigation is ongoing.” The report of the reassignment marks the latest chapter in Trump’s ongoing scuffle with the judge, who imposed a partial gag order on the former president Monday in his federal criminal case. The order bars Trump from “publicly targeting” Chutkan’s staff, special counsel Jack Smith’s or his staff, and any other court personnel. It also bans him making inflammatory statements about those individual’s families and potential witnesses in the case.