Despicable, but what did you expect?
Still the only voter ID anyone should need
Continuing a dramatic reversal on voting rights under President Donald Trump, the U.S. Department of Justice is asking a federal appeals court to allow Texas to enforce a photo voter identification law that a lower court found discriminatory.
In a filing Thursday, the Justice Department asked the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals to block a lower court ruling that the state’s new voter identification law — Senate Bill 5, enacted in this year — failed to fix intentional discrimination against minority voters found in a previous strict ID law, enacted in 2011.
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Siding with Texas, the Justice Department says in its filing that the state has a “strong likelihood” of successfully arguing that SB 5 fixes discrimination in the old law. Allowing SB 5 to take effect will “avoid confusion among voters and election officials,” Thursday’s brief states.
The brief does not mention a key piece of Ramos’ rulings throughout the case: that lawmakers intentionally discriminated against Latino and black voters in passing its 2011 ID law. Findings of intentional discrimination typically allow for more sweeping remedies in court.
See here and here for the background. As we know, the Obama Justice Department was strongly opposed to this law, but Justice did a heel turn back in July under the new management. I note that like the AG’s office they decline to address the big honking klaxon in the room, that the 2011 law was enacted with discriminatory intent, which isn’t something that can be easily fixed with minor legislative tweaks. Seems like you have to really lean into the denial to make that case. Which doesn’t mean that it won’t work, just that it shouldn’t. It’s back to the Fifth Circuit for now.
UPDATE: And now we know that a three-judge panel at the Fifth Circuit has bought the argument and stayed Judge Ramos’ ruling pending the appeal. I was already heading to bed when that news broke. I’ll have a post about this tomorrow.
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