Three state court rulings ease voting restrictions ahead of US elections

Court rulings in three separate states – Nebraska, Alabama and Georgia – have reversed or halted controversial measures that would have limited the ability to vote in the upcoming United States election.

The trio of decisions comes as the November 5 general election approaches in a matter of weeks. An array of local, state and national offices will be on ballots across the country, including the race for the presidency.

The rulings also underscore the myriad battles for voting access in the US.

In Alabama, one judge took action against an apparent effort to purge the voter rolls. In Nebraska, another judge upheld the right to vote for those who have completed their felony sentences. And in Georgia, a court declared new rules unconstitutional that would have allowed election results to be more easily contested.

Some of the efforts struck down on Wednesday are a result of persistent election misinformation.

Former President Donald Trump, the current Republican candidate for the presidency, has long claimed – falsely – that the US elections are marred by fraud, sowing doubt in the accuracy of the results.

Trump has used this argument to question his defeat to Democrat Joe Biden during the 2020 presidential race. Some Republican officials have responded by seeking restrictive measures they say are needed to protect against election malfeasance.

On Wednesday, however, voting rights groups hailed the raft of court decisions as victories for Americans’ constitutional rights.

“In a win for Alabama voters, a federal court has BLOCKED Alabama’s illegal voter purge program targeting naturalized citizens,” the Campaign Legal Center wrote on the social media platform X.

The group was among those challenging the voter-roll purge in the southern state.

“This is a huge victory for our clients,” it wrote.

Alabama

In the right-leaning southern state of Alabama, US District Judge Anna Manasco issued a preliminary injunction against a voter purging programme launched by the Republican Secretary of State Wes Allen in August.

Allen said the programme was aimed at removing “noncitizens” from the voter rolls in Alabama. Studies have shown, however, that claims of noncitizen voting have been massively overblown.

The US Department of Justice and voting rights groups also argued that Allen’s programme – which rendered certain voters inactive – could disenfranchise citizens who should be able to legally vote.

Any voters rendered inactive would have had to provide additional documents to be able to vote on November 5.

But opponents of the measure successfully argued that Allen’s move violated a federal law barring the systemic removal of names from voter rolls 90 days before a federal election.

Furthermore, the secretary of state’s chief of staff, Clay Helms, also testified that 2,000 of the 3,251 people deemed “inactive” had, in fact, been legally registered citizens.

More than 900 had already taken steps by September to restore their voter status.

Nebraska

In a separate ruling in midwestern Nebraska, the state’s top court upheld a law allowing felons who have completed their sentences to vote.

In so doing, the court rejected the argument by Nebraska’s Republican Secretary of State Robert Evnen that the law, which was passed in April, violated the state constitution.

The court ordered him to implement the law immediately. Evnen has said his office would comply with the decision and that state election officials had begun allowing citizens with felony convictions to register to vote.

Jonathan Topaz, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union, said the ruling means potentially thousands more citizens will be able to vote.

“We are grateful the Nebraska Supreme Court invalidated this lawless attempt to reinstate permanent felony disenfranchisement,” Topaz said in a statement.

The April law is part of a trend across the US to increase voting access for those with felony convictions. In the last quarter-century, an estimated 26 states have taken similar measures to restore some degree of voting access to those with felony records.

According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, approximately 10 states suspend voting rights indefinitely for those with felonies, either mandating a pardon for voting access to be restored or requiring the formerly imprisoned to meet some other restrictive standard.

Georgia

In a third decision on Wednesday, a judge in Georgia ruled that seven new election rules passed by the Republican-dominated State Election Board were “illegal, unconstitutional and void”.

One of the rules required poll workers to count ballots on election day by hand. Voting rights groups had said the requirement would slow down the counting process and increase the chances of mistakes.

Other rules had to do with how local officials certify election results. The wording of the rules sparked concerns that officials could refuse to certify their county’s vote tallies if they claimed they were concerned over fraud. The judge ruled they are mandated to certify the results.

Another rule would have required someone delivering an absentee ballot in person to provide a signature and photo identification.

Speaking to The Associated Press, former state Representative Scot Turner, a Republican who led a challenge to the new measures, called the ruling “a complete and total victory for the Constitution of the United States”.

“This is not about party. It’s about doing what’s constitutional and reestablishing separation of powers, and that’s something that every conservative in this country should be concerned with and support,” he said.