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WASHINGTON (CN) — In a partial win for the Republican National Committee, the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday said Arizona can enforce a proof-of-citizenship law for state ballot registration forms in the 2024 election.
The apparent 5-4 order, however, rejected the requirement for the presidential ballot or voting by mail.
In 2022, the Arizona Legislature amended state voter requirements and ordered county recorders to terminate any voter registration not verified with a birth certificate, passport, driver’s license, tribal identification number or naturalization number.
The high court’s order forces the state to enact the novel law for state registration forms against election officials’ concerns about implementing new requirements months before the November election. The law has never been enforced because Arizona’s secretary of state refused to do so even before litigation began.
Per their custom, the justices are not required to disclose their vote on emergency applications, but all of the women on the bench indicated they were in the four-justice minority against enforcing the law for state ballots. Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, Amy Coney Barrett and Ketanji Brown Jackson would have denied the application in full. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch said they would have granted the application in full.
None of the justices offered their reasoning.
The Biden administration and advocacy groups like Mi Familia Vota claimed proof-of-citizenship requirements violated the National Voter Registration Act. Voting advocacy groups said citizenship requirements do more harm than good, preventing qualified voters from exercising their rights. According to a recent survey, over 21.3 million American citizens could not provide this documentation.
The Republican National Committee and state legislative leaders intervened to defend the law.
Republicans have pushed proof-of-citizenship laws despite minimal evidence of broad voter fraud by noncitizens. GOP members in the U.S. House of Representatives passed a long-shot bill requiring proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections, though it’s currently languishing in the Senate.
In separate litigation, other advocacy groups are challenging the law through a consent decree, which they claimed prevented Arizona from enforcing proof-of-citizenship requirements on state registration forms.
Siding with the federal government and voting rights groups, a lower court temporarily and then permanently enjoined Arizona from enforcing federal-form and state-form document requirements.
The Ninth Circuit initially blocked the injunction based on the consent-decree claim but another appeals panel reversed, keeping the entire law on pause.
The Republican National Committee asked the Supreme Court to intervene, arguing that the lower courts were interfering with Arizona’s authority over elections.
Top law enforcement officials in Arizona argued the opposite. Arizona’s attorney general said the lower court ruling provided clear guidance for the upcoming election, whereas the Republicans’ stay request would be destabilizing.
Arizona’s attorney general said enforcing these requirements now put election officials in a “strange” situation because they would need to reject state registration forms that lack proof of citizenship even if the official can see that the applicant provided proof to the state department of motor vehicles.
The state said notices have already gone out to some voters about when their general election ballot will be mailed. Enforcing the law would force election officials to notify all those individuals that they can no longer vote by mail.
“Bottom line: In this situation, the state’s interests are better served by denying a stay and allowing the normal appellate process to play out,” state Attorney General Kris Mayes wrote in a brief before the court.
The Biden administration warned against judicial intervention that “would undermine the orderly administration of the election, risking the disfranchisement of thousands of voters who have already registered to vote using the federal form.”
The Democratic National Committee said a stay would force election officials to reject applicants who they know are qualified to vote.
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