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Supreme
Court
could
put new
limits
on
voting
rights
lawsuits
By
MARK
SHERMAN
apnews.com
WASHINGTON
- Eight
years
after
carving
the
heart
out of a
landmark
voting
rights
law, the
Supreme
Court is
looking
at
putting
new
limits
on
efforts
to
combat
racial
discrimination
in
voting.
The
justices
are
taking
up a
case
about
Arizona
restrictions
on
ballot
collection
and
another
policy
that
penalizes
voters
who cast
ballots
in the
wrong
precinct.
The
high
court’s
consideration
comes as
Republican
officials
in the
state
and
around
the
country
have
proposed
more
than 150
measures,
following
last
year’s
elections,
to
restrict
voting
access
that
civil
rights
groups
say
would
disproportionately
affect
Black
and
Hispanic
voters.
A
broad
Supreme
Court
ruling
would
make it
harder
to fight
those
efforts
in
court.
Arguments
are set
for
Tuesday
via
telephone,
because
of the
coronavirus
pandemic.
“It
would be
taking
away one
of the
big
tools,
in fact,
the main
tool we
have
left
now, to
protect
voters
against
racial
discrimination,”
said
Myrna
Perez,
director
of the
Brennan
Center
for
Justice’s
voting
rights
and
elections
program.
Arizona
Attorney
General
Mark
Brnovich,
a
Republican,
said the
high
court
case is
about
ballot
integrity,
not
discrimination.
“This is
about
protecting
the
franchise,
not
disenfranchising
anyone,”
said
Brnovich,
who will
argue
the case
on
Tuesday.
President
Joe
Biden
narrowly
won
Arizona
last
year,
and
since
2018,
the
state
has
elected
two
Democratic
senators.
The
justices
will be
reviewing
an
appeals
court
ruling
against
a 2016
Arizona
law that
limits
who can
return
early
ballots
for
another
person
and
against
a
separate
state
policy
of
discarding
ballots
if a
voter
goes to
the
wrong
precinct.
The
9th U.S.
Circuit
Court of
Appeals
ruled
that the
ballot-collection
law and
the
state
policy
discriminate
against
minority
voters
in
violation
of the
federal
Voting
Rights
Act and
that the
law also
violates
the
Constitution.
The
Voting
Rights
Act,
first
enacted
in 1965,
was
extremely
effective
against
discrimination
at the
ballot
box
because
it
forced
state
and
local
governments,
with a
history
of
discrimination,
including
Arizona,
to get
advance
approval
from the
Justice
Department
or a
federal
court
before
making
any
changes
to
elections.
In
2013,
the
Supreme
Court
ruled
5-4 that
the
portion
of the
law
known as
Section
5 could
no
longer
be
enforced
because
the
population
formula
for
determining
which
states
were
covered
hadn’t
been
updated
to take
account
of
racial
progress.
Congress
“must
identify
those
jurisdictions
to be
singled
out on a
basis
that
makes
sense in
light of
current
conditions,”
Chief
Justice
John
Roberts
wrote
for a
conservative
majority.
“It
cannot
rely
simply
on the
past.”
Democrats
in
Congress
will try
again to
revive
the
advance
approval
provision
of the
voting
rights
law. The
John
Lewis
Voting
Rights
Advancement
Act
failed
in the
last
Congress,
when
Republicans
controlled
the
Senate
and
President
Donald
Trump
was in
the
White
House.
But
another
part of
the law,
Section
2,
applies
nationwide
and
still
prohibits
discrimination
in
voting
on the
basis of
race.
Civil
rights
groups
and
voters
alleging
racial
bias
have to
go to
court
and
prove
their
case
either
by
showing
intentional
discrimination
in
passing
a law or
that the
results
of the
law fall
most
heavily
on
minorities.
The
new
Supreme
Court
case
mainly
concerns
how
plaintiffs
can
prove
discrimination
based on
the
law’s
results.
The
arguments
are
taking
place
against
the
backdrop
of the
2020
election,
in which
there
was a
massive
increase
in early
voting
and
mailed-in
ballots
because
of the
pandemic.
Trump
and his
Republican
supporters
challenged
the
election
results
by
advancing
claims
of fraud
that
were
broadly
rejected
by state
and
federal
courts.
But
many
Republicans
continue
to
question
the
election’s
outcome,
despite
the
absence
of
evidence.
GOP
elected
officials
have
responded
by
proposing
to
restrict
early
voting
and
mailed-in
ballots,
as well
as
toughen
voter
identification
laws.
The
challenged
Arizona
provisions
remained
in
effect
in 2020
because
the case
was
still
making
its way
through
the
courts.
But
Brnovich
said
last
year’s
voting
is
another
reason
the
justices
should
side
with the
state.
“I think
part of
the
lesson
of 2020
was that
when
people
don’t
believe
that
elections
have
integrity
or that
their
vote is
being
protected,
it will
lead to
undermining
the
public’s
confidence
in the
system,”
Brnovich
said.
Civil
rights
groups
said the
court
should
not use
this
case to
make it
harder
to root
out
racial
discrimination,
which
“still
poses a
unique
threat
to our
democracy,”
as the
NAACP
Legal
Defense
and
Educational
Fund put
it in a
brief.
Nearly
75
businesses,
including
PayPal,
Levi
Strauss
and
Impossible
Foods,
joined
in a
brief
urging
the
court to
“fully
preserve
the
Voting
Rights
Act.”
The
Justice
Department
will not
be part
of
Tuesday’s
arguments,
a rarity
in a
voting
rights
case.
The
Trump
administration
backed
Arizona.
The
Biden
administration,
in a
somewhat
cryptic
letter
to the
court,
said
this
month
that it
believes
“neither
Arizona
measure
violates
Section
2’s
results
test,”
but
doesn’t
like the
way its
predecessor
analyzed
the
issues.
The
suggestion
from the
new
administration
could
give the
court a
narrow
way to
uphold
the
Arizona
provisions
without
making
any
significant
changes
to
voting
discrimination
law.
A
decision
is
expected
by early
summer.
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