WASHINGTON, D.C. — Following reports that a Michigan Republican Party official considered challenging the eligibility of voters whose homes have been foreclosed upon, the U.S. Department of Justice and Congress are reviewing allegations of voting irregularities nationwide.

U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) lawyers are reviewing whether Michigan GOP officials planned to challenge the eligibility of voters whose homes had been foreclosed on, according to J. Gerald Hebert, executive director of the Campaign Legal Center and a former DOJ attorney.

Hebert contacted his former colleagues to recommend that they review the allegations, and lawyers in DOJ’s Voting Rights Section called Hebert for guidance. A Justice Department spokesman did not return repeated calls for comment.

Meanwhile, two House committees will hold hearings this week to determine whether state and local governments are prepared for an election in which record turnout is expected.

The House Judiciary and the House Administration committees will meet Wednesday to gather testimony from state and local officials. Tomorrow’s judiciary hearing will address issues related to voter registration; ballot security; voting technology; the recruitment and training of poll workers; and the practice of “caging,” or challenging the eligibility of a specific group of voters, namely college students and minorities, by sending mailings to specific addresses and keeping track of the ones that are returned.

On Thursday, the House Administration Committee will also examine what local officials are doing to protect university students’ voting rights.

In the short term, Congress can do little to combat fraud or deter attempts to keep voters from the polls, said Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), senior member of the Judiciary Committee, in a phone interview last week.

“We cannot enact legislation to do anything,” Nadler said. “We can only make it more public and bring pressure on the Justice Department.”

Partisan posturing on vital issue to democracy

The political fight over who can vote on Election Day has broken down along party lines. Democrats want to stop efforts to discourage or turn people away from voting while Republicans want to make sure that only those who can prove that they are who they say they are cast ballots.

The Republican National Committee’s lawyers have already started a Web site tracking cases of voter registration fraud. In a conference call with reporters on Monday, an RNC lawyer said the goal is “to dispel the idea that [fraud] is some sort of myth perpetuated by Republicans. It is not.”

Top Democrats, meanwhile, have sought to put political pressure on the McCain campaign and the Justice Department.

House Judiciary Committee chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) sent a letter to Attorney General Michael Mukasey asking him to launch an investigation into the allegations in Michigan and a separate letter to McCain asking the Arizona Republican to “denounce” and “repudiate any efforts by the Republican Party to engage in voter suppression and intimidation tactics.”

Sen. Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential nominee; vice presidential nominee Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del.; and a dozen Democratic colleagues also sent a letter to Mukasey asking him to review the Macomb County Republican Party’s alleged plan to challenge the eligibility of voters who have lost their homes.

Obama’s campaign also filed a lawsuit in federal court in Michigan seeking to bar the GOP from engaging in caging.

There has been little legislative progress in combating such practices. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., and Conyers have introduced legislation to curb caging and other voter suppression efforts, but their bills will not reach the Senate and House floors this year.

Jonathan E. Kaplan is Washington correspondent for the Center for Independent Media’s network of online news sites.