Tomorrow Justices Hear Major Voting Rights Case | Kavanaugh Ruffles Conservative Feathers Over Pro-Trump Election Lawsuits
March 1, 2021
I'D LIKE TO KNOW WHERE YOU GOT THE NOTION
|Tomorrow, the Supreme Court will hear a major voting rights case out of Arizona. Jess Bravin with The Wall Street Journal reports the case could have broad ramifications for the future of the Voting Rights Act. It’s “the first in a pipeline of high-stakes litigation following the legal frenzy that marked the 2020 election season.” Two Arizona provisions are at issue. One is a rule disallowing votes cast in the wrong precinct, and the other has to do with vote-by-mail.
TO BLOCK THE VOTE
|Adam Liptak with The New York Times makes note of the context surrounding tomorrow’s voting rights case by noting, “As Republican state lawmakers around the nation are working furiously to enact laws making it harder to vote, the Supreme Court on Tuesday will hear its most important election case in almost a decade, one that will determine what sort of judicial scrutiny those restrictions will face.” Liptak explains Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act prohibits voting practices that discriminate on the basis of race. But with six conservative justices now on the bench at SCOTUS, civil rights groups worry the high court will use this week’s case as an opportunity to render Section 2 completely useless.
DON'T BLOCK THE VOTE BABY
|“Two Arizona laws are at issue in the virtual oral arguments before the justices. One requires election officials to reject ballots cast in the wrong precincts. The other concerns voting by mail and provides that only the voter, a family member or a caregiver can collect and deliver a completed ballot.” Pete Williams with NBC News says Arizona “far outpaces” other states when it comes to throwing out out-of-precinct ballots. It rejects 11 times more than the next highest state. Arizona Democrats argue the state has a history of changing its polling places — more often in minority neighborhoods — which likely leads to mistakes in registration and voting information.
SO OVER IT
|John Kruzel with The Hill reports conservatives aren’t so pleased with the recent performance of JUSTICE BRETT KAVANAUGH. Last week, the Trump appointee appeared to have been the deciding vote preventing SCOTUS from taking up pro-Trump election lawsuits. JUSTICES ALITO, THOMAS, and GORSUCH dissented from the court’s decision, with Thomas in particular calling out his colleagues’ reluctance to take on the disputes. Kruzel writes, “As is typical practice, the justices did not provide the public with a complete view of how they voted on the petitions, or their reasoning. But the dissents by Thomas, Alito and Gorsuch strongly suggested that Kavanaugh lost his appetite to engage with the election-related disputes. If so, Kavanaugh’s vote this week marked a reversal from his previous stance. In the run-up to the November election, he joined Thomas, Alito and Gorsuch in siding with Pennsylvania Republicans in their emergency bid to roll back voter accommodations Trump alleged were illegal.”