By David Zimmermann October 28, 2024 at 8:54 AM
Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares took Virginia’s noncitizen voter case to the Supreme Court on Monday after a lower-court blocked officials from purging noncitizens aliens from their voter lists.
On Sunday, a federal appeals court backed the Friday decision of a lower court that ordered Virginia restore 1,600 suspected noncitizens ineligible for voting to its voter lists. Miyares, and Glenn Youngkin (both Republicans), responded by pledging to bring the case before the Supreme Court in the nine days remaining until the election. They carried out their promise on Monday.
The Supreme Court is asked to stop the Sunday appeals court decision. Virginia’s emergency request to stay the injunction stated that “not only would the Commonwealth of Virginia suffer irreparable harm without a stay but also its voters and public in general.”
The U.S. Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit , unanimously upheld a federal district judge’s ruling that Virginia’s removal of aliens was too close to November’s election. This violated the National Voter Registration Act of 1992. The court of appeals agreed that the program to remove aliens from the rolls was a “systematic removal”, rejecting the request by the state to block the order.
Virginia’s latest ruling, which notes that the state may still “prevent citizens from voting through cancellation of registrations on a case-by-case basis or prosecutions against any citizen who votes”, says Virginia’s claim for an immediate appeal is weak. Virginia officials claimed that federal law does not cover the removal of noncitizens.
Miyares promised that he would appeal the decision to the Supreme Court as soon as possible. Youngkin supported this decision.
Youngkin wrote that it was commonsense to not have noncitizens on the voter list. “Thank you to [Miyares] who filed an urgent appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court of the order that Virginia put back over 1,500 self-identified noncitizens on the voter roll.”
Judge Patricia Giles has sided with Department of Justice, who earlier this month sued the Virginia Department of Elections for violating National Voter Registration Act. This Act includes a “quiet-period” provision which prevents states removing voters within 90 days of an election. This provision was designed to prevent mistakes at the last minute.
The lawsuit was formally filed by the plaintiff on October 11, in response to Youngkin’s executive order of August, which required that voter lists be updated daily to remove any ineligible people.
The ruling on Friday was criticized by Donald Trump, the former president, who had been worried about non-citizens participating in elections.
Trump wrote in X. “Only U.S. citizens should be allowed the vote.”
According to the Migration Policy Institute, there are over a quarter of a million illegal immigrants in Virginia. Nearly 4.5 million Virginians will vote in 2020.
FairfaxGOP originally wrote this and published it as Virginia takes non-citizen voting case to Supreme Court before Election
