A legal tug-of-war over Virginia's voter registration rolls reaches the nation's highest court as state officials challenge recent judicial decisions.
According to AP News, Virginia has petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday to permit the removal of approximately 1,600 individuals from its voter rolls, whom state officials believe are not citizens.
The state's Republican governor, Glenn Youngkin, implemented an executive order in August mandating daily cross-checks between Department of Motor Vehicles data and voter registration records to identify potential noncitizens.
Under this system, flagged voters received notifications and a two-week window to contest their disqualification by confirming their citizenship status.
U.S. District Judge Patricia Giles determined the program violated federal law by conducting systematic voter purges during a protected 90-day period before the November election. This ruling was subsequently upheld by a unanimous decision from a three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond.
The Justice Department and various private organizations challenged Youngkin's program, arguing that the quiet period exists to protect legitimate voters from administrative errors that could disenfranchise them close to an election. Evidence presented in court revealed that some removed voters were actually citizens.
The appeals court emphasized that Virginia's claim of being forced to keep noncitizens on voter rolls was incorrect, noting that the state's removal process failed to definitively establish the citizenship status of those purged.
A parallel situation unfolded in Alabama, where a federal judge ordered the reinstatement of over 3,200 voters previously classified as ineligible noncitizens.
Court testimony revealed that approximately 2,000 of these voters were legally registered citizens.
The appeals court panel, led by Biden appointee Toby Heytens and joined by Obama appointees Albert Diaz and Stephanie Thacker, clarified that while Virginia maintains the right to remove noncitizens from voter rolls, such removals must follow an individualized process rather than a systematic data-matching approach.
The state's actions affect a small fraction of Virginia's nearly 6 million registered voters, but the case highlights ongoing tensions between voter access and election integrity measures.
The dispute centers on the interpretation of federal election law and its quiet period provisions, which restrict systematic voter removals within 90 days of an election. Virginia maintains its program upholds state law requiring the cancellation of noncitizen registrations.
The outcome of this Supreme Court appeal could establish important precedents for how states manage voter roll maintenance while balancing federal election law requirements and voter protection measures. The case continues to draw attention as election officials nationwide grapple with similar challenges in maintaining accurate voter rolls.
