SCOTUS Upholds Lower Court's Ruling on North Carolina Voter ID Law

There has been much talk of voter fraud surrounding the recent presidential election. 

Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by millions, but President Trump insists that he would have won had it not been for widespread voter fraud. 

This Monday, the Supreme Court rejected an appeal to reestablish a controversial voter identification law in North Carolina. This leaves in place a federal appeals court ruling that removed key parts of the law including its voter ID requirements, an elimination of same-day registration, a rollback of early voting to 10 days from 17, and its ban on counting votes cast in the wrong precinct. 

Last summer, the 4th US Circuit argued that North Carolina’s law “disproportionately affected African-Americans.” For example, the voter ID provision “retained only those types of photo ID disproportionately held by whites and excluded those disproportionately held by African-Americans.” 

The court concluded that the law was enacted “with discriminatory intent.”

The situation is similar to the court fight in Texas, where a voter ID law was struck down as racially discriminatory. 

Voter ID laws in North Carolina and Texas were established following the Supreme Court’s 2013 decision to scrap a provision of the federal Voting Rights Act – a move that significantly weakened federal oversight of voting rights legislation.

The Dems argue that voter ID laws are a form of voter suppression that make it harder for minority groups to cast ballots, and the new laws were immediately challenged by the Obama Administration.

North Carolina Republicans rightly argue that voter ID laws are a necessary requirement to ensure the integrity of our elections, but had no evidence of voter fraud to present to the court. 

Earlier this month, President Trump announced the creation of a bipartisan commission that will be tasked with investigating voter fraud and determining the scale of it during the 2016 election.

The commission may be in a position to provide evidence of voter fraud that North Carolina and other states can use to ensure the passage of vital voter identification laws.  

“All North Carolinians can rest assured that Republican legislators will continue fighting to protect the integrity of our elections by implementing the commonsense requirement to show a photo ID when we vote,” promises North Carolina House Speaker Tim Moore.

Author’s Note: According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 32 states already have some kind of voter ID law in place. With congressional majority, now may be the chance for the GOP to take another crack at voter ID requirements and other election changes. 

Editor’s Note: The Supreme Court really rejected this on a technicality. More to come…