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Introduction:
As we approach the next pivotal election, ensuring the integrity of our electoral process has never been more crucial. In his recent article for The Daily Signal RNC Scores Election Law Victories in These Swing States. Here’s What That Could Mean in November, Fred Lucas outlines key legal victories secured by the Republican National Committee in several swing states. These wins highlight the ongoing constitutional debate over state control of election laws and federal oversight. Read on to understand how these rulings may impact the upcoming election and what they mean for the future of American democracy.
Constitutional Relevance:
These legal victories are deeply rooted in constitutional principles, particularly the balance of power between state governments and the federal government as outlined in the U.S. Constitution. The Supreme Court’s decisions, such as those in Arizona, reaffirm the states’ rights to determine their own election procedures under the Tenth Amendment. Additionally, the enforcement of voter ID laws and ballot verification measures touches upon the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, ensuring that all citizens have fair access to the voting process while maintaining the integrity of elections. This ongoing dialogue underscores the Constitution’s vital role in shaping and guiding election laws to preserve democratic values and protect the rights of voters across the nation.
The Republican National Committee this week filed election-related lawsuits in Michigan and North Carolina, coming off a Supreme Court victory last week over election procedures in Arizona.
An RNC initiative called Protect the Vote has filed more than 100 lawsuits across 25 states and recruited more than 150,000 lawyers and volunteer poll watchers across the country.
“We are defending the law and fighting for commonsense security measures that benefit all Americans—like stopping illegal immigrants from voting, mail ballot safeguards, voter ID measures, stopping leftist dark money, and cleaning the voter rolls,” Gineen Bresso, director of election integrity for the Republican National Committee, told The Daily Signal in a written statement. “We are winning in court and have recruited over 150,000 volunteers for the election. We are protecting the vote for all Americans.”
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The Democratic National Committee didn’t respond to inquiries for this story.
Previously, however, the DNC issued statements criticizing Republicans’ litigation and asserting that RNC leadership was chosen by former President Donald Trump to “push lies” about the 2020 election. That leadership would be “anti-democracy” and promote conspiracy theories, the DNC said.
In August, the Democratic National Committee filed lawsuits opposing Republican-backed election procedures in Arizona and Georgia.
The Republican National Committee has pending litigation in Georgia, Nevada, and other states where the Nov. 5 presidential election looks close. Here, however, are five states where the GOP has gained major victories.
1. Arizona and Noncitizen Voting
The Republican National Committee won a partial victory Aug. 22 when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to allow Arizona to enforce its law requiring proof of U.S. citizenship during voter registration.
Under the ruling, election officials may reject voter registration forms without proof of citizenship. The high court stayed a federal district court ruling while it awaits a hearing before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
The lower court struck down provisions of Arizona’s law that require an election official to reject a voter registration that doesn’t include proof of U.S. citizenship. Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes and Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, both Democrats, opted not to defend the state law.
So the RNC filed an emergency application to the Supreme Court to allow the state to fully enforce the law, which its ruling did.
“This is a major victory for election integrity that upholds a simple principle: American elections must be decided by American citizens,” RNC Chairman Michael Whatley said in a public statement on the high court’s decision.
Fontes, Arizona’s secretary of state, opposed the court ruling.
“My concern is that changes to the process should not occur this close to an election, it creates confusion for voters,” Fontes said in a public statement. “We respect the court’s decision and will implement these changes while continuing to protect voter access and make voting a simple process.”
Earlier this year, Arizona’s election system garnered increased scrutiny when billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk posted on his social media platform X, formerly Twitter: “Arizona clearly states that no proof of citizenship is required for federal elections.”
That’s technically correct, but no other state requires proof of U.S. citizenship to vote in federal elections, either. Arizona, however, requires such proof before someone may vote in state and local elections.
That’s because in 2013, the Supreme Court ruled 7-2 in Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Ariz. Inc. that the 1993 National Voter Registration Act, known as the motor voter law, determined that every state must accept the same standardized voter registration forms for federal elections.
However, the ruling, written by then-Justice Antonin Scalia, said Arizona’s law requiring proof of U.S. citizenship to vote could apply to state and local elections but not federal ones.
As a result, Arizona uses two different ballots for state and federal elections. A state resident with documented proof of citizenship may vote using both ballots. A voter without proof of citizenship may still vote for president and Congress.
2. Stopping Presumptions in Michigan
The Republican National Committee joined the Michigan Republican Party and Wayne County Republican Committee this week to sue the city of Detroit for not hiring a sufficient number of Republican election inspectors.
Michigan law requires hiring an equal number of Democrats and Republicans for election roles. But the GOP plaintiffs allege that Detroit has hired seven times as many Democrats as election inspectors.
The RNC gained a victory in Michigan after suing Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, regarding her instructions to local election clerks to presume—rather than verify—the validity of an absentee voter’s signature.
“In Michigan, we stopped the secretary of state’s illegal instructions to ignore mail ballot safeguards,” the RNC’s Bresso said.
The RNC teamed with the state Republican Party to argue that the instruction violated the Michigan Constitution, which requires verification of signatures. They won a partial victory in June when state Judge Christopher Yates ruled that Benson’s decision is a presumption that is “a foul under Michigan law.”
After the ruling, a spokesperson for Benson’s office noted that the judge agreed the secretary of state has authority to implement other ballot rules for the state’s more than 1,500 independent election clerks.
“Michigan’s clerks have and will continue to carefully review every ballot signature to ensure they agree sufficiently with the signature on file before accepting any ballot,” Benson spokesperson Angela Benander said, according to The Detroit News.
Going back to 2020, the RNC and the state party teamed to intervene in a lawsuit brought by a Democratic super PAC, Priorities USA, to strike down Michigan’s state ban on the process known as ballot harvesting.
In September 2022, a federal court upheld the ban, which allowed for the tracking of absentee ballots.
Ballot harvesting is when political operatives distribute or collect large quantities of absentee ballots, prompting concerns of voter intimidation or improper influence.
3. Poll Watchers in North Carolina
The Republican National Committee also filed two lawsuits against the North Carolina State Board of Elections in a span of four days in late August.
One lawsuit alleges the state election board failed to require identification to prove U.S. citizenship, a violation of the 2002 Help America Vote Act. The state and national GOP contend this lapse opens up the opportunity for as many as 225,000 noncitizens to vote.
The previous week, the RNC sued the Tar Heel State alleging that it failed to check jury questionnaire responses to identify and remove noncitizens from voter registration lists.
These cases go on after an earlier Republican National Committee victory in North Carolina.
In a 2022 case, the RNC argued that the State Board of Elections was trying to weaken the rights of poll watchers. It scored a victory that August when the state’s Rules Review Commission rejected restrictions on the election board’s new poll watchers.
The State Election Board’s rules would have prevented poll watchers from standing too close to voting machines or poll books, and also give election officials the authority to remove poll watchers.
The following October, Wake County Superior Court Judge Vince Rozier sided with the RNC and blocked the rule preventing “at-large,” party-appointed poll watchers from going to different polling locations throughout Election Day.
The county court, however, also sided with the state board and moved back the date by which ballots must be accepted to Nov. 14, six days after the Nov. 8 election in 2022. The normal deadline of Nov. 11 fell on Veterans Day that year.
Patrick Gannon, the spokesperson for the State Election Board, told the Carolina Journal: “We are grateful that the judge denied the plaintiffs’ request to shorten the absentee ballot deadline. … The county boards of elections will, of course, abide by the judge’s ruling tweaking the replacement procedure for party observers. That is a polling place management issue that our bipartisan poll workers can be trusted to handle.”
4. Parity in Wisconsin
In Wisconsin, the Republican National Committee won a case to enforce the state’s law requiring an equal number of Republican and Democrat poll workers.
“We successfully fought for poll worker parity and poll watcher protections,” the RNC’s Bresso told The Daily Signal.
The RNC also notes that it sued after finding the city of Appleton, Wisconsin, didn’t have GOP poll workers to assist in nursing homes. The city agreed to hire Republicans as well as Democrats.
The RNC also sued to achieve an equal number of election workers from each major party in the Wisconsin cities of Green Bay and Milwaukee.
State law requires the two major parties to have relatively equal numbers of election workers.
In September 2022, a state court ruled in favor of the RNC’s challenge of guidance by the Wisconsin Elections Commission. The guidance had instructed local election officials to fill in missing information on absentee ballot forms and to witness affidavits.
Judge Michael Aprahamian ruled that the elections commission “cannot continue to promulgate advice it knows—or should know—violates state law and the intent of the Legislature.”
Others objected, such as Claire Woodall-Vogg, executive director of the Milwaukee Election Commission, who told The Associated Press: “Historically, voters have not been penalized for minor errors in voting where intent is clear.”
5. Verifying Mail-In Ballots in Pennsylvania
In May, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on a mail-in ballot verification case in Pennsylvania that had worked its way through state and federal courts.
In the 2022 midterm elections, several county election boards in Pennsylvania announced plans not to enforce a law requiring voters to put a date on their mail-in ballots in order for the ballots to be counted.
The Republican National Committee teamed with the Pennsylvania Republican Party to sue and force those county boards to enforce the law. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court sided with Republicans, prohibiting the counting of undated or misdated ballots.
In response, several liberal groups sued in federal court to challenge the state law requiring mail-in ballots to be dated before being counted.
Among them were Pennsylvania branches of national left-leaning organizations such as the NAACP, the League of Women Voters, and Common Cause. They were joined by state-based or local groups such as Philadelphians Organized to Witness, Empower and Rebuild; the Black Political Empowerment Project; and Make the Road Pennsylvania.
Last November, a federal district court struck down Pennsylvania’s requirement of dated mail-in ballots.
But in May, the 2-1 ruling by a 3rd Circuit panel upheld the law.
Ari Savitzky, the senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project who argued the case, told reporters after the ruling that “voters may be disenfranchised for a minor paperwork error like forgetting to write an irrelevant date on the return envelope of their mail ballot.”
“We are considering all of our options at this time,” Savitzky said. “And we will not stop fighting for voters.”
Whatley, the RNC’s chairman, said: “Pennsylvanians deserve to feel confident in the security of their mail ballots, and this 3rd Circuit ruling roundly rejects unlawful left-wing attempts to count undated or incorrectly dated mail ballots.”
SOURCE: THE DAILY SIGNAL
