Judges must prevent the disenfranchisement of thousands of eligible voters.
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This week, I’m turning The Briefing over to my colleague Sean Morales-Doyle, director of the Brennan Center’s Voting Rights Program, to share news about disenfranchisement in three states.

—Michael Waldman

In recent weeks, state officials in Alabama, Ohio, and Virginia announced extreme measures to ensure that only citizens are voting, even though there is not a scintilla of evidence

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that noncitizen voting is a problem. And they’re doing it just days before the election, even though they and their ideological allies have been trying to scare people with this conspiracy theory for months. Why now?

This isn’t about election integrity. Quite the opposite. It’s a cynical attempt to discourage participation by legal immigrant voters, to sow chaos, and to prime voters for a second round of lies about a stolen election.

Let’s start in Ohio, where Secretary of State Frank LaRose ordered local election officials to demand citizenship papers from naturalized citizens at the polls, and to discard their votes if they don’t return to the office with those papers within a few days.

Aside from being xenophobic and discriminatory, this last-minute change of policy is flatly illegal. We know this because 18 years ago, the Brennan Center obtained a permanent injunction against precisely this policy. The Brennan Center and our partners have now gone back to court to enforce that order. Although LaRose hasn’t disputed the fact that he has violated the court’s injunction, he has nevertheless chosen to contest the case. We are awaiting the judge’s decision.

LaRose’s policy is a solution in search of a problem. Despite combing through many years of voting records, Ohio officials have been able to identify only six possible noncitizens who cast votes in Ohio between 2008 and 2020. Even if every one of those cases is proven, that’s less than one noncitizen vote in a million in any given election.

While LaRose’s order will not improve election integrity, it will certainly disenfranchise eligible voters. The secretary didn’t even bother to announce the new policy publicly, meaning that naturalized citizens weren’t put on notice that they should carry their citizenship papers to the polls.

In Alabama and Virginia, state officials have attempted to remove thousands of voters from the rolls on suspicion that they are noncitizens. To be clear, state officials have the right and obligation to maintain accurate voter rolls. But if there was any reason to doubt the eligibility of these voters, they should have been contacted and given the opportunity to prove their citizenship status long before Election Day. By waiting until just weeks before voting began, election officials risked disenfranchising legitimate voters.

As part of a Justice Department lawsuit over the attempted purge, election officials in Alabama checked their work and found egregious errors. As the federal judge hearing that case noted, Alabama’s secretary of state “admitted that his purge list included thousands of United States citizens.” And it’s not yet clear whether any of the voters purged were actually noncitizens.

Because of the risk of exactly this kind of mistake and the resulting disenfranchisement, federal law prohibits purges like this in the 90 days before a federal election. For that reason, federal judges have ordered the reinstatement of the challenged voters in both Alabama and Virginia. Virginia has appealed to the Supreme Court, which has agreed to rule on whether to put a hold on the lower court’s decision. This should be an easy case: Virginia election officials have not proven that even one single person among the 1,600 voters they removed from the rolls at the 11th hour is a noncitizen.

Although human errors can happen, states have multiple systems in place to deter noncitizen voting. Those who violate the law face prison time and deportation. There is no need to risk disenfranchising thousands of eligible voters in an attempt to stamp out the vanishingly few and ultimately meaningless handful of cases of noncitizen voting.

Ask yourself: If noncitizen voting were really a problem, why do the efforts to solve it end up disenfranchising eligible voters and breaking the law? The truth is our elections are safe and secure.





The Strength of the Election System

“Trump, backed this time by Republicans who have adopted his pre-emptive election denial, will try again to defy the voters if they choose Harris,” Barton Gellman writes in Time. And compared with 2020, both the Republican Party apparatus and his network of election deniers are more organized and better prepared. Despite these pressures, the election process is now more secure, with bipartisan reforms and resilient election officials determined to ensure an accurate outcome. Polling safeguards, public audits, and clear certification rules aim to protect against manipulation. “The system, according to everyone I asked, will hold up,” Gellman writes. Read more

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How Election Certification Holds Up Against Subversion

Election certification is a mandatory formality marking the end of the rigorous, multistep vote-counting process. But since 2020, at least 30 officials have threatened or refused to certify election results based on unfounded claims of voter fraud. As we approach the end of the 2024 presidential race, the potential for similar disruptions raises concerns. Our new explainer details certification procedures in seven battleground states and explains what happens if officials attempt to go rogue. Read more

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Prosecutors Aren’t Driving Crime

Pro-reform prosecutors seeking to move away from overincarceration and excessively harsh sentencing have faced pushback as critics allege that their policies drive up crime. But a new Brennan Center analysis reveals that there is no clear link between prosecutorial reforms and crime trends. Read more

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Gerrymandering Quashes Competition

Gerrymandering means that control of the House will come down to only about 30 of this year’s 435 House races. “With few checks on partisan abuses, the path to a House majority now runs largely through districts drawn by commissions, courts, and divided governments, or in states with strong legally enforceable map-drawing rules,” Michael Li and Gina Feliz write. Read more

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Dark Money’s Growing Influence on Congressional Races

Groups affiliated with congressional party leadership are taking more money than ever from secretive donors and spending it on the most competitive races. Dark money groups have actually decreased their election spending since 2012 — but this paints a misleading picture. In reality, these groups have simply redirected their funds to super PACs or strategically timed ads to dodge disclosure requirements. As a result, the public can’t see how much money is pouring into elections and where it comes from. “This trend is certain to continue unless Congress cuts off dark money by closing those loopholes,” Ian Vandewalker writes. Read more

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The Real FBI Bias Isn’t What Project 2025 Claims

The Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 alleges that the FBI and Justice Department are biased against conservatives, but evidence shows otherwise. Historically, the FBI has targeted civil rights activists, while recent oversight investigations reveal patterns of racial and gender discrimination within the agency itself. The FBI’s handling of cases such as the Brett Kavanaugh investigation indicates a conservative lean rather than bias against conservatives. “The only way to curb abuse at the FBI and Justice Department is to narrow the bureau’s focus to evidence of wrongdoing,” Michael German writes. Read more

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Why Ohio’s High Court Election Matters

Three seats on the Republican-controlled Ohio Supreme Court are up for election this fall, and the outcomes could decide the fate of abortion rights, direct democracy, gun regulations, and other crucial issues in the state. A new State Court Report article examines the candidates vying for these positions and lays out the stakes of the races. Read more

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PODCAST: Promoting Justice and Public Safety Since the Pandemic

Our latest episode discusses how crime has become a political wedge issue used to stoke anxiety and stir division. While crime rates are dropping after the pandemic spike, some politicians are still pushing for harsher punishments and repeal of reforms. Our panel of experts explores the latest data on crime trends, evidence-based solutions for reducing crime, and strategies to lower recidivism and promote successful reentry into society. Together, they show how reducing crime can be a bridge to unite Americans rather than pulling them apart. Listen on Spotify

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, Apple Podcasts

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, or your favorite podcast platform

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News

Patrick Berry on felony disenfranchisement laws // GUARDIAN

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Alice Clapman on how election misinformation spreads online // CNN

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Andrew Garber on voting access for unhoused Americans // NATION

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Lawrence Norden on foreign interference in U.S. elections // ROLL CALL

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