WASHINGTON, DC – Arizona can continue to require proof of citizenship to register to vote as court litigation continues, but once registered, people can vote in presidential elections and by mail ballots without such proof, a divided Supreme Court said. The verdict was given On Thursday.
Arizona election law has required proof of citizenship since 2004. In 2013, the Supreme Court ruled that federal law allowing voter registration with a federal form that didn’t require proof of citizenship preempted state laws, including Arizona’s. Since then, registrants who use the standard registration form have had to provide proof, but applicants who know about the federal option can still use it and avoid proving they’re U.S. citizens.
Lawmakers in the Grand Canyon State then passed the Election Integrity Act of 2022, which among other things states that Arizonans cannot vote in presidential elections or vote by mail without proof of citizenship. Democratic allies relentlessly sued to expand mail-in and early voting, and lower court judges blocked Arizona’s law.
The injunction is currently under appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. While that appeal is pending, the Republican National Committee (RNC) has filed a petition with the Supreme Court to stay the lower court’s injunction, allowing the law to remain in full effect for the 2024 elections while the litigation continues.
On Thursday, the Supreme Court issued a split decision, split between three parties, allowing parts of Arizona’s law to go into effect but not others. Appeals are ongoing and will ultimately be left to the justices to decide. None of the justices stated why they voted, so at this point no one knows if their vote reflects a final decision on the legal issue.
Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh were the swing votes. They upheld the provision requiring proof of citizenship when registering on state forms, but did not lift a lower court’s injunction against provisions banning voting in presidential elections and voting by mail without proof of citizenship. They could still vote that way if the appeal ultimately reaches the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court’s two most conservative justices, Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, voted for Arizona on all three issues, with liberal Justice Neil Gorsuch joining in.
The remaining four justices voted to block all of these requirements, including Justice Amy Coney Barrett as well as the three liberal justices, but it’s possible that Justice Barrett will side with the conservatives when the case finally comes up for hearing, perhaps later in 2025.
“Today’s split decision shows that election integrity continues to prevail,” Ambassador Ken Blackwell, director of the Center for Election Integrity at the America First Institute, told Breitbart News exclusively. “We will continue the fight to make it easier to vote and harder to cheat, and we hope to demonstrate to the majority of justices that all of these aspects of Arizona’s law are entirely legal ways to protect the ballot box.”
Case Application RNC vs. Mi Familia VotaCase No. 24A164 in the U.S. Supreme Court.
Breitbart News senior legal contributor Ken Kurkowski is a former White House and Justice Department lawyer. Follow us on X (formerly Twitter) Kenkrukowski Instagram Kenkrukowski.
