While some states are fighting back against U.S. Justice Department requests for access to their voter registration lists and other elections information, Ohio has begun the four-year process of ensuring voter rolls here are as clean as they can be.

Among the states that have received requests from the federal government so far, Minnesota, New Hampshire and Wisconsin have simply said “no.” Officials there say they have questions about the legality of the requests and how the information will be used.

After all, state elections officials are responsible for their own voter rolls, not someone in Washington, D.C. As one piece in the Ohio Capital Journal put it, “Power over voter registration lists is the power to shape the electorate.”

It is a mark of the importance of those lists that there is such a fight to begin with. And the Justice Department has informed the National Association of Secretaries of State that it will eventually contact ALL of them regarding voter lists, even though it knows states are resisting.

Surely Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose, too, has questions about why the federal government is seeking voter registration information. We can only hope that when the Justice Department comes calling, he asks the same questions as Minnesota, New Hampshire and Wisconsin.

And, if Ohioans are confident in the work of our county and state elections officials, there is no need for the federal government to meddle, right? Again, LaRose must understand he needs to hold fast if and when that problem presents itself.