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U.S. Justice Department will watch Tuesday’s election closely in several Michigan communities

"File:Michigan Hall of Justice Daytime.jpg" by Grosscha is licensed with CC BY 3.0. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0

The U.S. Justice Department will be closely watching Tuesday’s election in seven Michigan communities.

The D.O.J’s Civil Rights Division plans to have personnel in 44 jurisdictions in 18 states to monitor for compliance with the federal voting rights laws.

In Michigan, Justice Department observers will be in Detroit, Flint, Jackson, Eastpointe, Shelby Township, Highland Park and Hamtramck.

A Justice Department spokeswoman says “Every federal election year, the Department makes a new assessment of where the Department should be, and send out staff based on that assessment for that year.”

She declined to say why specific communities were chosen to be put under the federal microscope.