EMERGENCY DOCKET
Supreme Court allows Virginia to remove suspected non-citizens from voter rolls

By Amy Howe
on Oct 30, 2024 at 11:07 am

The Supreme Court on Wednesday temporarily blocked an order by a federal judge that would have required Virginia to return more than 1,600 people to the voter rolls. U.S. District Judge Patricia Tolliver Giles found that since early August the state had canceled the registration of more than 1,600 voters – at least some of whom were U.S. citizens eligible to vote – under a program intended to remove suspected noncitizens from the voting rolls.

In a brief unsigned order on Wednesday morning, the justices granted Virginia’s request to put Giles’ order on hold while a challenge to it continues. Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson indicated that they would have denied the state’s request.

The Biden administration and several civic and immigrant rights groups went to federal court to challenge an Aug. 7 executive order by Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin. Youngkin directed the state’s department of motor vehicles to provide state election officials with data on a daily basis to allow them to identify and cancel the voter registration of suspected noncitizens unless they could verify their citizenship within 14 days.

The Biden administration and the private challengers contend that Youngkin’s order violates a provision of the National Voter Registration Act known as the “quiet period” provision, which generally prohibits states from “systematically” removing ineligible voters within 90 days of a federal election. ... Giles barred the state from continuing the program, although she left open the prospect that the state could still remove voters on an individual basis – for example, if they had died or are not eligible to vote because of a criminal conviction.

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Recommended Citation: Amy Howe, Supreme Court allows Virginia to remove suspected non-citizens from voter rolls, SCOTUSblog (Oct. 30, 2024, 11:07 AM), https://www.scotusblog.com/2024/10/supreme-court-allows-virginia-to-remove-suspected-non-citizens-from-voter-rolls/