Virginia settles voting rights suit brought by NAACP to protect college students

The NAACP has won a legal victory for college students in Virginia who want to register to vote in the state’s elections.

On Thursday, a federal judge approved a consent decree requiring state election officials to accept voter registration applications completed by college students that they had been rejecting in the past – hint, hint, in the Glenn Youngkin-Jason Miyares years – because of basic omissions like a missing dorm room number or campus mailbox number.

Go figure, this was a particular issue at HBCUs in Virginia, like Norfolk State University, Virginia State University, Hampton University.

Mere coincidence.

Under the consent decree:

1. Virginia students who live on campus will not have their registration applications rejected for providing an address that does not include a dorm name, dorm room number, campus mailing address, or campus mailbox number, when that information is not needed to place students in a precinct.
2. Virginia officials must provide guidance and training to local registrars on this requirement and on how to handle student voter registration applications.
3. Officials must amend Virginia’s voter registration application to make clear what address information is needed for people living in student dormitories and other group housing.
4. Virginia officials must engage in rulemaking efforts to codify the new registration requirements in the Virginia Administrative Code.

The NAACP and Advancement Project had filed suit ahead of the November 2025 state election cycle.

That was when a MAGA, Jason Miyares, was the attorney general.

With a Democrat, Jay Jones, an African American, now in that position, the state moved to enter into a settlement with the plaintiffs.

“This consent decree is a major win for Virginia voters,” said John Powers, Legal Director at Advancement Project.  “For too long, too many Virginia college students have been disenfranchised due to unnecessary and burdensome restrictions.  This agreement removes those barriers and mandates important reforms that will allow more students to register successfully and cast ballots that count.”

“This agreement makes clear that eligible voters cannot be denied access to the ballot based on technicalities that have nothing to do with their eligibility,” said Anthony P. Ashton, Senior Associate General Counsel at NAACP.

“College students in Virginia — particularly those at historically Black colleges and universities — have faced unnecessary and unlawful barriers to voter registration,” Ashton said. “This consent decree sends a strong message that those practices will not stand. The NAACP will continue to fight to ensure that every eligible voter, regardless of age or address, has a fair and equal opportunity to participate in our democracy.”