Derek T. Muller is a professor of law at Notre Dame Law School, where he teaches election law, federal courts, and civil procedure. His research focuses on the role of states in administering federal elections, voting rights, and the Electoral College. He is a contributor to the Election Law Blog, a co-reporter for the American Law Institute's Restatement of the Law, Election Litigation, and a co-author of a Federal Courts casebook. He has testified before Congress on election administration. Before entering teaching, he clerked for Judge Raymond Gruender of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit and practiced litigation at Kirkland and Ellis. He previously taught at Pepperdine University and the University of Iowa College of Law before joining Notre Dame in 2023. He also teaches evidence and comparative election law.
DI has documented statements by Derek Muller on 2026 Midterm Elections, Election Security, and Voting Rights. Read the quotations, original sources and related cases below.
Role at the time: University of Notre Dame law professor
Condemned
Statement summary
Muller argues that the statute does not authorize DOJ to block certification of the Alaska Senate result.
“The statute simply doesn’t let the Department of Justice enjoin certification”
Open source (opens in a new tab)Trump says he ordered DOJ's Alaska lawsuit; Devan Barber condemns itTrump airport comments and Devan Barber statement; updated 10:44 p.m. Eastern
Why we used this label
Muller says the statute does not let DOJ enjoin certification. This directly rejects the legal basis for the requested intervention, the action under scrutiny in this case.
DOJ seeks conditional restraint on Alaska Senate certification because two candidates share a name. Murkowski and Peltola criticize the intervention; the department argues that alleged voter confusion warrants relief.
