Newsom's fiery claim DOJ has 'no business' monitoring CA election blasted by Trump official: 'Calm down bro'

By Fox News Politics · Fox News Politics

California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom’s rebuke of the Justice Department’s move to monitor the November election in his state is getting strong pushback, including from a DOJ official who noted the move is not out of the ordinary. "Donald Trump's puppet DOJ has no business screwing around with next month's election," Newsom posted on Friday in response to news the DOJ plans to send federal election watchers to California and New Jersey for their closely watched elections next month. "Sending the feds into California polling places is a deliberate attempt to scare off voters and undermine a fair election. We will not back down. Californians decide our future — no one else." Many on social media, including DOJ Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon, quickly pointed out that the Justice Department has a long history of sending election monitoring resources to areas that have a history of issues to ensure election laws are being followed. NEWSOM THREATENS TO SUE IF TRUMP SENDS TROOPS TO SAN FRANCISCO: 'WANNABE TYRANT' "Lol calm down bro," Dhillon posted on X . "The @TheJusticeDept under Democrat administrations has sent in federal election observers for decades, and not once did we hear that this was voter intimidation from states such as California. Do you really want to go there? Isn’t transparency a good thing?" Dr. Houman Hemmati posted on X , "Hey @GavinNewsom WHY would any legitimate voter be "scared off" by having federal election observers? Most people think legitimate voters would be more likely to vote because they’d trust the process. "But clearly you’re afraid of something. I wonder what that is…" Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, a Republican candidate for governor in California to replace the term-limited Newsom, wrote on X , "Gavin sure seems worried about people seeing how he's handling elections." The Republican parties in both California and New Jersey requested the federal observers as California votes on a ballot measure a…