Trump Supreme Court sides with Youngkin, Miyares on Virginia voter purge

The Trump Supreme Court has decided to allow Glenn Youngkin and Jason Miyares to purge 1,600 Virginia voters from the state’s voter rolls, gutting voter protections that had been enshrined in a 1993 federal law.

The 6-3 vote split along ideological lines – the Trump side and the three liberals on the court.

The one-page order didn’t offer a legal rationale for the decision to overturn a lower-court ruling that had sided with the Department of Justice, which had brought suit against the  Youngkin-Miyares voter purge, alleging that the removal was done in violation of a section of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 known as the Quiet Period Provision, which requires states to complete systematic programs aimed at removing the names of ineligible voters from voter registration lists no later than 90 days before federal elections.

The Quiet Period Provision applies to certain systematic programs carried out by states that are aimed at striking names from voter registration lists based on a perceived failure to meet initial eligibility requirements – including citizenship – at the time of registration.

The Justice Department case included the story of one natural-born citizen who has voted in Virginia for more than 20 years who was told she was unregistered because she hadn’t checked the “U.S. Citizen” box on a DMV form; a second story involves a naturalized U.S. citizen who was removed because of issues with an update to her driver’s license in 2018.

Youngkin’s office issued a statement on his behalf in which the Republican governor was quoted saying the ruling was a “victory for commonsense and election fairness.”

“Clean voter rolls are one important part of a comprehensive approach we are taking to ensure the fairness of our elections,” Youngkin said. “Virginians also know that we have paper ballots, counting machines not connected to the internet, a strong chain of custody process, signature verification, monitored and secured drop boxes, and a ‘triple check’ vote counting process to tabulate results. Virginians can cast their ballots on Election Day knowing that Virginia’s elections are fair, secure, and free from politically-motivated interference.”