A federal judge appointed by Democrats ordered Virginia on Friday to add more than 1,500 allegedly self-identified noncitizens, back onto the voter rolls of the state before the November election.
“Let’s be clear about what just happened: only eleven days before a Presidential election, a federal judge ordered Virginia to reinstate over 1,500 individuals — who self-identified themselves as noncitizens — back onto the voter rolls,” Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin said in a statement.
The order was issued in response to the request of the Biden-Harris Department of Justice that had sued last week the Commonwealth to stop its Elections Department from removing noncitizens, and other ineligible voters from the voter list before November 5.
The highly politicized organization claimed that such actions were violations of the 1993 National Voter Registration Act. This law mandates that states complete “not later than 90 days prior to the date of a primary or general election for Federal office, any program the purpose of which is to systematically remove the names of ineligible voters from the official lists of eligible voters.”
Giles “issued a preliminarily injunction… to restore all [individuals] who had been removed from the state voter rolls within the last 90 day, finding that removals were in fact ‘systematic’ and not individualized.” She reportedly used this logic to argue that the state had violated federal laws.
Youngkin argued that almost all of the more than 1,500 “self-identified foreign nationals” removed from the rolls had “previously presented immigration documents that confirmed their non citizenship, a recent fact verified by federal officials.” The Republican Governor also noted that the state law used to remove the individuals from the register lists was signed by the then-Gov. Tim Kaine is a Democrat and now a U.S. Senator. Senator.
Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares also expressed his outrage over Giles’ decision on Friday in a statement. The chief law enforcement official of the commonwealth expressed his concerns about the “open practice by the Biden and Harris administration to weaponize legal system against enemies of the so-called progress.”
“That’s the definition of lawfare.” Miyares stated that openly choosing weaponization over good processes and lawfare above integrity isn’t democratic: it’s pure bullying. I stand up against bullies every time.
Youngkin and Miyares both announced that the Commonwealth would appeal the ruling to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals and, “if necessary”, the U.S. Supreme Court.
