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Op-Ed:
Supreme Court upholds states’ efforts to ensure voter integrity
[The Center Square] Michael O’Neill |
Landmark Legal Foundation
The Supreme Court on
Thursday correctly concluded that states could enact commonsense and
necessary protections to ensure the integrity of their electoral
systems. States like Georgia, Iowa and Florida can rest assured that
specious challenges to their legitimate efforts to guarantee the
sanctity of the vote will not be supported by activist judges. |
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 The Supreme Court overturned a decision by the Ninth Circuit
striking down two policies Arizona uses to protect voting. First, the Supreme
Court ruled that Arizona’s policy requiring in-person voters to vote in their
designated precincts did not violate the Voting Rights Act. In practice, the
overwhelming majority of in-person voters (both minority and non-minority) in
Arizona vote in the correct precinct and challengers could only show a minute
difference in the numbers of minority versus non-minority votes rejected. This
wasn’t enough to sustain an allegation that the policy posed a significant
barrier to voting.
Second, the Court ruled that the Voting Rights Act did not
prohibit Arizona from limiting who could handle mail ballots. Arizona’s policy
prohibited “ballot harvesting,” a practice where left-wing groups descend upon
vulnerable populations such as nursing home residents, exert influence on these
voters and collect their ballots. The inherent vulnerabilities associated with
widespread usage of vote by mail requires protections such as limitations on who
may handle these types of ballots. Challengers to this provision only presented
anecdotal evidence that the prohibition adversely affected minority voters. In
other words, they did not show that banning ballot harvesting harmed a
measurable number of voters.
Under our constitutional system, states are empowered to regulate the time place
and manner of their elections. The Court sets forth five factors in determining
whether a given voting protection is legal. Lower courts will now look to the
size of the burden imposed by the protection, simple inconvenience is not enough
to sustain a challenge. They will also look to how much the rule departs from
voting standards when the Voting Rights Act was passed. Third, courts must
analyze the size of the disparities in a rule’s impact on minority versus
minority groups. Fourth, a court should look at a state’s entire voting system
and the opportunities afforded to voters before concluding a single protection
is illegal.
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Finally, a court must consider the state’s interest
in preventing voter fraud. Justice Samuel Alito, writing for the
majority, states, “[f]raud can affect the outcome of a close
election, and fraudulent votes dilute the right of citizens to cast
ballots that carry appropriate weight.” He continues, “[f]raud can
also undermine public confidence in the fairness of elections and
[their] perceived legitimacy.” This means that a state has a
legitimate interest in “[e]nsuring that every vote is cast freely,
without intimidation or undue influence…”
Overturning the Ninth Circuit’s decision means that
non-substantive challenges to a state’s voting or voting
registration laws will not survive. Simple allegations that a
particular practice is inconvenient for a few dozen or a couple of
hundred voters (out of millions) does not mean that the practice is
discriminatory. Nor does it mean that the practice should be banned
at the expense of voter security.
In 2020, many states began to implement widespread use of
vote-by-mail. The more individuals elect to vote by mail, the
greater the need for increased protections. Protections such as
limiting those who can handle ballots and requiring an individual to
verify his or her identify before receiving a ballot are reasonable
and necessary to guarantee that the electorate has faith in the
outcome of the election. And these laws ensure Americans continue to
have confidence in the fundamental fairness of the election process.
The Supreme Court’s decision means efforts to protect the sanctity
of the vote will not fail when leftists challenge protections on our
right to vote. But the fight continues. Even now, Democrats in
Congress are pushing multiple pieces of legislation that will
federalize the election process and empower Chuck Schumer, Nancy
Pelosi and Washington bureaucrats with authority to declare voting
protections invalid.
For the time being, states may take reasonable measures to protect
the integrity of their electoral systems and the courts will not
interfere. Whether this continues remains to be seen.
Michael O’Neill is the Assistant General Counsel at
Landmark Legal Foundation |
