EPEC NEWS

Progressive groups file lawsuit in a bid to stop Election Department’s voter-list maintenance programs that check legal presence codes with other state databases. And the DOJ follows suit later in the day.

UPDATED From EPEC Team:

Virginia’s League of Women Voters and other progressive activists are suing Virginia’s Commissioner of Elections, Susan Beals, and other election officials in an attempt to stop the department’s voter-list maintenance that has removed over 6,000 noncitizens from voter rolls over a two-year period.

Filed by the Virginia Coalition for Immigrant Rights (“VACIR”), League of Women Voters of Virginia and League of Women Voters of Virginia Education Fund (together “LWVVA” or “the League”) the federal suit also names the Virginia State Board of Elections Members, and Attorney General Jason Miyares.

The suit takes aim at the so-called 90-day rule in Section 8 of the NVRA, which precludes “systemic” cancellations of registrations in case they are eligible.

It brands Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s election-focused Executive Order #35 he signed in August as a “Purge Program,” a term cited repeatedly throughout the complaint.

The word purge appears nowhere in Gov. Youngkin’s EO, which can be seen here. It states:

“All data collected by the DMV that identifies noncitizens is shared with ELECT, which uses it to scrub existing voter rolls and remove noncitizens who may have purposefully or accidentally registered to vote,” Youngkin wrote. “According to data from ELECT, between January 2022 and July 2024, records indicate we removed 6,303 noncitizens from the voter rolls.”

Youngkin’s EO also directed the Dept. of Motor Vehicles verify the legal status of driver license applicants with the federal SAVE (Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements) database.

Meanwhile the League of Women Voters’ social media profile is urging the noncitizens to re-register anyway. In Virginia, it is a Class 6 felony to for noncitizens to register and to illegally cast a ballot. It is also a Class 6 felony for anyone to entice ineligible individuals to register to vote.

The last-minute lawsuit is confusing in that it takes issue with Virginia’s adherence to federal and Virginia statute in providing the alleged noncitizens a 14-day notice to affirm their citizenship as required.

It claims that “federal law mandates that no such voter cancellation or list maintenance programs may be conducted during the 90-day “quiet period” before an election.” See legal filing here.

The lawsuit wants a judge to believe that wholesale, systemic, wiping out of voters is occurring from the voter rolls. But that’s not the case.

The Department of Elections is undertaking basic list maintenance procedures required under the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) that ensures voter rolls are accurate. Virginia’s Constitution says only United States citizens can cast ballots.

EI groups have watched as the Elections Department has become more opaque with publicly available data available under the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).

If the lawsuit succeeds it could force Virginia officials to allow noncitizens to remain on the rolls. EPEC Team has documented at least 1,000 ballots that noncitizens cast before they were removed from the rolls in the past year alone.

Observers wonder if this suit is ripe for the Republican National Committee or the Republican Party of Virginia to join.

The trend is clear. Conservative voting-rights groups are suing to demand that states follow the law and remove ineligible voters. Progressive groups are suing to prevent voter-roll maintanence by claiming that, because noncitizens are not allowed to vote, the maintenance programs should stop.

For example, in Nevada, PILF has had to sue to get the Secretary of State to review the registrations of people using vacant lots, gas stations, even police stations as their residential address. In Michigan, the RNC has sued the SoS who also has refused to remove deceased voters from the rolls.

The latest lawsuit by the League of Women Voters claims that, by enacting basic list maintenance, the Department of Elections is violating the NVRA because it has implemented programs that remove noncitizens who rolled onto the rolls – either by accident or who are seeking to exploit a weakness in the “Motor Voter” program that automatically flows all data of individuals from the DMV to the Dept. of Elections, even when they decline to be registered.

The case cites no citizens who were believed to be harmed by the system for removing noncitizens who were never eligible to be registered.

The case could also backfire on leftwing groups if a judge rules that NVRA’s list-maintenance procedures are in foce throughout the year and don’t get a 90-day break. #

UPDATE: After EPEC Team published the story, the Department of Justice announced it was suing Virginia for the same reasons as the LWV.

Gov. Youngkin issued a statement in response, saying:

“With less than 30 days until the election, the Biden-Harris Department of Justice is filing an unprecedented lawsuit against me and the Commonwealth of Virginia, for appropriately enforcing a 2006 law signed by Democrat Tim Kaine that requires Virginia to remove noncitizens from the voter rolls – a process that starts with someone declaring themselves a non-citizen and then registering to vote. Virginians – and Americans – will see this for exactly what it is: a desperate attempt to attack the legitimacy of the elections in the Commonwealth, the very crucible of American Democracy. With the support of our Attorney General, we will defend these commonsense steps, that we are legally required to take, with every resource available to us. Virginia’s election will be secure and fair, and I will not stand idly by as this politically motivated action tries to interfere in our elections, period.”