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Supreme Court allows Virginia effort to strike possible noncitizen voters

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May 29, 2001
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A divided Supreme Court cleared the way Wednesday for Virginia officials to remove about 1,600 voters from the state’s registration rolls less than one week before the presidential election.
Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) asked the justices to intervene after two lower courts blocked his efforts to cancel the registrations of voters who could be noncitizens — an issue Republican officials have seized on nationally to energize supporters even though noncitizen voting is extremely rare.


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Youngkin signed an order in August to expedite the removal of registered voters whose driver’s license applications indicated or suggested that they were not U.S. citizens. The effort was opposed by the Justice Department and immigrant rights groups, who said eligible voters were being kicked off the rolls because of outdated or erroneous information.


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As is typical in emergency situations, the Supreme Court’s brief order did not explain the majority’s reasoning. The three liberal justices — Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson — noted their dissent, saying they would have denied Youngkin’s request to allow the voter purge.
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In a statement on X, Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares called the decision a “victory for commonsense and election fairness.”
The high court is increasingly being drawn into election-related disputes as voters begin casting ballots ahead of next week’s contest between Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris. Legal battles over voting rules are percolating largely in battleground states such as Pennsylvania, Georgia and Nevada, and the justices are likely to get pulled into additional litigation in the coming days.



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In the Virginia case, the challengers sued state officials, saying they were making changes too close to the election and removing eligible voters in their efforts to remove noncitizens. Fully qualified voters who skipped or overlooked the question have been caught up in the purge, as have those who became citizens years after their first interaction with the Department of Motor Vehicles, the challengers said.
“Everyone agrees that States can and should remove ineligible voters, including noncitizens, from their voter rolls. The only question in this case is when and how they may do so,” Solicitor General Elizabeth B. Prelogar, representing the Biden administration, told the justices in court papers.
Across the country, Republicans have backed ballot measures in eight states to specify that only U.S. citizens are participating in elections, even though noncitizen voting is already restricted in all state and federal elections. Noncitizens are permitted to vote in school or municipal elections in 19 communities, including Washington, D.C.



Last week, U.S. District Judge Patricia Tolliver Giles ruled against Youngkin, saying a federal law known as the National Voter Registration Act prohibits states from purging their voter rolls within 90 days of a federal election. Giles halted the program until the day after the Nov. 5 elections and directed the state to send letters to all 1,600 people purged from the rolls, instruct registrars to reinstate those people and publicize that the removal process has stopped.
“What I find is a clear violation of the 90-day quiet provision,” Giles said in court, referring to the federal law. “It is not happenstance that this executive order was announced on the 90th day.”
On Sunday, a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit upheld the decision, and Virginia asked the Supreme Court to intervene.



Youngkin told the justices in a court filing that the forced restoration of voters would create confusion, overload election machinery and “likely lead noncitizens to think they are permitted to vote, a criminal offence that will cancel the franchise of eligible voters.”
Trump tweeted that Giles’s ruling was “crazy” and proof of a “truly Weaponized Department of ‘Injustice.’”
 
A divided Supreme Court cleared the way Wednesday for Virginia officials to remove about 1,600 voters from the state’s registration rolls less than one week before the presidential election.
Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) asked the justices to intervene after two lower courts blocked his efforts to cancel the registrations of voters who could be noncitizens — an issue Republican officials have seized on nationally to energize supporters even though noncitizen voting is extremely rare.


Cut through the 2024 election noise. Get The Campaign Moment newsletter.

Youngkin signed an order in August to expedite the removal of registered voters whose driver’s license applications indicated or suggested that they were not U.S. citizens. The effort was opposed by the Justice Department and immigrant rights groups, who said eligible voters were being kicked off the rolls because of outdated or erroneous information.


ADVERTISING


As is typical in emergency situations, the Supreme Court’s brief order did not explain the majority’s reasoning. The three liberal justices — Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson — noted their dissent, saying they would have denied Youngkin’s request to allow the voter purge.
Follow Election 2024
In a statement on X, Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares called the decision a “victory for commonsense and election fairness.”
The high court is increasingly being drawn into election-related disputes as voters begin casting ballots ahead of next week’s contest between Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris. Legal battles over voting rules are percolating largely in battleground states such as Pennsylvania, Georgia and Nevada, and the justices are likely to get pulled into additional litigation in the coming days.



End of carousel

In the Virginia case, the challengers sued state officials, saying they were making changes too close to the election and removing eligible voters in their efforts to remove noncitizens. Fully qualified voters who skipped or overlooked the question have been caught up in the purge, as have those who became citizens years after their first interaction with the Department of Motor Vehicles, the challengers said.
“Everyone agrees that States can and should remove ineligible voters, including noncitizens, from their voter rolls. The only question in this case is when and how they may do so,” Solicitor General Elizabeth B. Prelogar, representing the Biden administration, told the justices in court papers.
Across the country, Republicans have backed ballot measures in eight states to specify that only U.S. citizens are participating in elections, even though noncitizen voting is already restricted in all state and federal elections. Noncitizens are permitted to vote in school or municipal elections in 19 communities, including Washington, D.C.



Last week, U.S. District Judge Patricia Tolliver Giles ruled against Youngkin, saying a federal law known as the National Voter Registration Act prohibits states from purging their voter rolls within 90 days of a federal election. Giles halted the program until the day after the Nov. 5 elections and directed the state to send letters to all 1,600 people purged from the rolls, instruct registrars to reinstate those people and publicize that the removal process has stopped.
“What I find is a clear violation of the 90-day quiet provision,” Giles said in court, referring to the federal law. “It is not happenstance that this executive order was announced on the 90th day.”
On Sunday, a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit upheld the decision, and Virginia asked the Supreme Court to intervene.



Youngkin told the justices in a court filing that the forced restoration of voters would create confusion, overload election machinery and “likely lead noncitizens to think they are permitted to vote, a criminal offence that will cancel the franchise of eligible voters.”
Trump tweeted that Giles’s ruling was “crazy” and proof of a “truly Weaponized Department of ‘Injustice.’”
It's funny how quickly SCOTUS can rule on some cases and take their time on others of higher urgency, namely Trump's "immunity" case.
 
Non citizens absolutely should not get to vote, but throwing out anyone's ballot needs to be based in fact not suspicion.
1. To be clear, we are not talking about throwing out ballots. We are talking about registration.
2. Here, the de-registrations were not based on suspicion, they were based on information from the motor voter form which reflected self-identification as a non-citizen. And, for persons adversely effected, there is notice and an opportunity to contest, and there is also a same day registration process (subject again to establishing citizenship).
 
Absolutely everywhere,.. google the story
It's not in Cigs story. It says their drivers licenses indicated or suggested they were non citizens. To me there is a big difference between indicated and suggested. Indicated would support your claim, suggested doesn't make sense. How would something be suggested on a DL application?
 
It's funny how quickly SCOTUS can rule on some cases and take their time on others of higher urgency, namely Trump's "immunity" case.
To be clear, the court routinely acts quickly on emergency stay requests such as this, because all they are doing is placing a hold on the process rather than ruling on the merits. The immunity case, by contrast, was a substantive decision which, fwiw, was also processed on a faster timeline than most scotus cases.
 
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It's not in Cigs story. It says their drivers licenses indicated or suggested they were non citizens. To me there is a big difference between indicated and suggested. Indicated would support your claim, suggested doesn't make sense. How would something be suggested on a DL application?

Cig's story is selective in the info it shares...
When you apply for a driver's license in Virginia you are automatically placed on the voting role,.. On the DMV license application there is a question that asks the applicant if they are a US citizen,... If the applicant checks the non-citizen box they are still placed on the voter role, with the stipulation that they "correct" their claim of non-citizenship within 14 days,.. These applicants did not respond, so per Virginia state law they are removed from the voter role...
 
It's not in Cigs story. It says their drivers licenses indicated or suggested they were non citizens. To me there is a big difference between indicated and suggested. Indicated would support your claim, suggested doesn't make sense. How would something be suggested on a DL application?
From the briefing in district court...

Consistent with these longstanding statutory obligations to ensure that only citizens are
registered to vote, the DMV asks every applicant for most DMV “document, or renewal
thereof,” the question, “[a]re you a citizen of the United States?” Va. Code Ann. §§ 24.2-410.1(A),
24.2-411.3; Koski Decl. ¶¶ 5–6; see Bryant Decl. Exs. B–D. The DMV asks the citizenship
question when issuing, renewing, or replacing a driver’s license or identification card or when
changing the address associated with such documents. Koski Decl. ¶¶ 5–6. All individuals
conducting one of these DMV transactions, whether in-person or online, are presented with the
citizenship question, and given the option to decline to answer. Koski Decl. ¶ 7. The question is
accompanied by a warning “that intentionally making a materially false statement during the
transaction constitutes election fraud and is punishable under Virginia law as a felony.” Va. Code
§ 24.2-411.3; Koski Decl. ¶ 7; Bryant Decl. Ex. D..
In addition to the citizenship question on these forms, all DMV customers are presented
with an electronic voter-registration application. Va. Code § 24.2410.1. Because only citizens can
vote, the application also asks about citizenship status. If a person answers that he is not a citizen,
a second screen will pop up stating that citizens cannot vote and asking him a second time whether
he is a citizen. Koski Decl. ¶ 11; Bryant Decl. Ex. D.
Virginia law requires the DMV to “furnish monthly to the Department of Elections a
complete list of all persons who have indicated a noncitizen status” on a DMV form. Va. Code
§ 24.2-410.1(A). Contrary to some assertions, only persons who affirmatively state that they are
not citizens are on the list sent to ELECT. Koski Decl. ¶¶ 12–14 If an applicant does not answer
the citizenship question, his information is not passed along to ELECT. Koski Decl. ¶¶ 13–14.

FWIW, you can view the actual form at page 105 of the appendix to the scotus application.
 
Cig's story is selective in the info it shares...
When you apply for a driver's license in Virginia you are automatically placed on the voting role,.. On the DMV license application there is a question that asks the applicant if they are a US citizen,... If the applicant checks the non-citizen box they are still placed on the voter role, with the stipulation that they "correct" their claim of non-citizenship within 14 days,.. These applicants did not respond, so per Virginia state law they are removed from the voting role...
The check of non citizen would indicate they were non citizens, but I'm curious about the ones that suggested they were non citizens. Are you saying the others left the question unanswered?
 
The check of non citizen would indicate they were non citizens, but I'm curious about the ones that suggested they were non citizens. Are you saying the others left the question unanswered?

No,.. I'm saying that the author of Cig's piece is selectively sharing elements of the real story,... There are no others,.. These people claimed to be non-citizens, they didn't correct their claim of non-citizenship,.. Nothing is being "suggested".
 
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Twenty-Sixth Amendment​

Twenty-Sixth Amendment Explained


Section 1​



The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.



Section 2​



The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
 
The left leaners on this board should applaud the ruling since they insisted there is already a law preventing noncitizens from voting. Remember that discussion?

Shouldn't they be doing this a year before an election and not months before an election so as to give people who were removed by error the most possible time to correct the information and re-register?

That's my problem here. Why does this stuff need to be done right before an election??

Do it in January.
 
Shouldn't they be doing this a year before an election and not months before an election so as to give people who were removed by error the most possible time to correct the information and re-register?

That's my problem here. Why does this stuff need to be done right before an election??

Do it in January.

In Virginia this happens continuously, on a daily basis,.. This was not a special sweep.
 
In Virginia this happens continuously, on a daily basis,.. This was not a special sweep.

Seems to me you should stop at some point before an election. Say you create a deadline to register for an election, the state gets to check the validity of your registration, if there is a problem you can appeal and/or correct errors and re-register after the deadline on the basis of having registered before.

We have deadlines before the election in which you have to register to vote if you want to vote in the next election. Seems to me that we should have deadlines for dropping people from voter rolls.
 
1. To be clear, we are not talking about throwing out ballots. We are talking about registration.
2. Here, the de-registrations were not based on suspicion, they were based on information from the motor voter form which reflected self-identification as a non-citizen. And, for persons adversely effected, there is notice and an opportunity to contest, and there is also a same day registration process (subject again to establishing citizenship).
And as a last safeguard, they are allowed to cast a provisional ballot that will be corrected to actual ballot if they have been purged unjustly and can prove as much.
 
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Seems to me you should stop at some point before an election. Say you create a deadline to register for an election, the state gets to check the validity of your registration, if there is a problem you can appeal and/or correct errors and re-register after the deadline on the basis of having registered before.

We have deadlines before the election in which you have to register to vote if you want to vote in the next election. Seems to me that we should have deadlines for dropping people from voter rolls.
See my post above. They can cast a ballot. But it wont be counted if they cant prove eligibility.
 
Why do you support non-citizens being able to vote in the US?
I agree. Why does the left want anyone not eligible to vote to be able to vote? Seems like something we should all be able to agree on.

The burden should be on the voter.

I cant vote in my polling place unless I have an ID and am on the printed registered voter list that they cross check. This isnt hard or mean or exclusionary.
 
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Shouldn't they be doing this a year before an election and not months before an election so as to give people who were removed by error the most possible time to correct the information and re-register?

That's my problem here. Why does this stuff need to be done right before an election??

Do it in January.
The challenged actions were in August. When I renewed my drivers license in that month it took me 15 minutes online
 
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See my post above. They can cast a ballot. But it wont be counted if they cant prove eligibility.
But how many people are going to fight to prove a provisional ballot is valid? After election day, they have to return to work and most of them will probably just say, "To hell with it. I don't have the time."?
 
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To be clear, the court routinely acts quickly on emergency stay requests such as this, because all they are doing is placing a hold on the process rather than ruling on the merits. The immunity case, by contrast, was a substantive decision which, fwiw, was also processed on a faster timeline than most scotus cases.
SCOTUS does not have to accept every case, they have that discretion. On the immunity case, it was IMO, simply a delaying action to prevent Trump from having to go to trial before the election. And given the ruling they came up with, they overturned over 2 centuries of precedent.

That decision was totally political.
 
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SCOTUS does not have to accept every case, they have that discretion. On the immunity case, it was IMO, simply a delaying action to prevent Trump from having to go to trial before the election. And given the ruling they came up with, they overturned over 2 centuries of precedent.

That decision was totally political.
Fine to quibble about process timing and litigants' motivations, but the fact remains that the case was actually processed quickly as merits cases go.

2 centuries of precedent? If I recall correctly, the court's analysis began with something along the lines of 'this is the first time in the history of the country that a for president has been prosecuted criminally for prior term conduct.'
 
The individuals in question claimed to not be citizens...
Not really. It seems likely the issue might be that their Drivers License application includes a checkbox for them to confirm they are a US citizen. Miss the box and you are the list. Even if you have checked the box multiple times in the past. So this is not claiming to be a non-citizen, this is missing a box in which you affirm you are a citizen. Big difference.

Further, this effort is supposedly illegal because states aren’t supposed to conduct these purges within 90 days of an election. Not sure if that was addressed. It that it matters, several justices will go along with anything the GOP asks.
 
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