This matter should be cut and dried. Instead, we now have a Biden-appointed federal judge telling the state of Virginia that it must reinstate more than 1,600 non-citizens back on its voter registration.
U.S. District Judge Patricia Giles granted an injunction request brought against Virginia election officials by the Biden-Harris Department of Justice.
It’s stunning that, just 11 days before the presidential election, a federal judge is ordering Virginia to reinstate individuals who have self-identified as noncitizens on the voter rolls. Virginia is prepared to take this to the U.S. Supreme Court if needed! pic.twitter.com/fyjlWBUlnQ
— Glenn Youngkin (@GlennYoungkin) October 25, 2024
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. https://t.co/QwloK1Sxr4
— Glenn Youngkin (@GlennYoungkin) October 25, 2024
Well, Governor Youngkin, why don’t you tell those at voter registration to ignore the unlawful ruling and tell the judge to enforce it if it’s so wrong? Why simply play politics with it?
Breanne Deppisch reports at Fox News:
Virginia’s election laws ensure ‘the cleanest voter roll in the country’: Gov. Glenn Youngkin
Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin criticizes the DOJ’s voting lawsuit against his state and reacts to former Trump staffers speaking out against the former president.
A federal judge on Friday ordered Virginia to halt its removal of potential non-citizens from state voter rolls, a decision expected to restore the voting rights to some 1,600 residents ahead of Election Day.
U.S. Judge Patricia Giles issued a preliminary injunction Friday to reinstate all voters that had been removed from state voter rolls in the state in the last 90 days, finding that the removals had been in fact “systematic,” not individualized, and were thus a violation of federal law.
In issuing the injunction, Giles said there is reason to believe voters were being mistakenly removed from the rolls. “This process has resulted in eligible voters having their voting registration flagged,” she said.
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And while Giles concurred it is “undoubtedly in the public interest for ineligible voters to be removed,” she noted it is also in the public interest “for states to comply with federal law particularly the right to vote.”
Glenn Youngkin speaks during Day 1 of the Republican National Convention
Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin speaks during Day 1 of the Republican National Convention (RNC), at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S., July 15, 2024. (REUTERS/Jeenah Moon)
The news comes just weeks after the Department of Justice sued Virginia over its program, arguing the removals were conducted too close to the Nov. 5 elections and violate the National Voter Registration Act– a federal law that requires states to halt all systematic voter roll maintenance for a 90-day “quiet period” before an election.
Justice Department officials also cited concerns that eligible votes may have incorrectly been removed from the rolls without adequate notice, or enough time to correct the mistake.
“States may remove names from official lists of voters in various ways and for various reasons, but they may not carry-on this kind of systematic removal program so close to a federal election,” DOJ officials wrote in filing their Oct. 11 lawsuit.
The injunction upholds this line of thinking, and sparked fierce, immediate pushback from Gov. Glen Youngkin, who has insisted the voters were removed legally and has himself objected to a court ruling less than two weeks before a federal election.
“This is a stunning ruling by a federal judge who is ordering Virginia to reinstate individuals who have self-identified as noncitizens back on the voter rolls,” Youngkin said on air on Fox News Channel via telephone shortly after the judge’s decision was announced.
At issue was an executive order signed by Youngkin in August that authorized the state to conduct “daily” updates to its voter rolls.
The order allowed the state to compare its Department of Motor Vehicles noncitizens list against its list of registered voters. Those without citizenship were then informed that their voter registration would be canceled unless they could prove their citizenship in 14 days.
Youngkin has insisted the voters were removed legally and is based on precedent from a 2006 state law enacted by then-Gov. Tim Kaine, a Democrat.
