UPDATE (Aug. 27, 2024) — It’s Groundhog Day in North Carolina. Just like last week’s lawsuit, the NC GOP have again asked a state court for relief that would squarely violate federal law, on the basis of a conspiracy theory that North Carolina’s voter rolls contain hundreds of thousands of ineligible voters hiding in plain sight. These cases should be seen for what they are: bad-faith attempts to sow chaos and doubt at the expense of North Carolinians’ right to vote.
Southern Coalition for Social Justice also has two voting rights attorneys available for comment:
- Chris Shenton, Voting Rights Counsel at SCSJ, chrisshenton@scsj.org
- Hilary Harris Klein, Senior Voting Rights Counsel at SCSJ, hilaryhklein@scsj.org
DURHAM, N.C. (Aug. 26, 2024) — The North Carolina Republican Party (NC GOP) and Republican National Committee (RNC) filed a cynical attack on our state’s elections last Thursday in Wake County Superior Court in a lawsuit that distorts state law, ignores federal law, and attempts to exploit and exacerbate anti-immigrant attitudes.
The lawsuit, seeking only to undermine confidence in North Carolina elections, pursues an outcome that the NC GOP and RNC know is not possible under federal law and ignores compliance efforts that the NC State Board of Elections has already taken. The end result is litigation that is designed to cause problems, not solve them.
Southern Coalition for Social Justice condemns the lawsuit, alongside Democracy NC, El Pueblo, and NCAAT in Action.
Why this lawsuit is doomed to fail and only hurt North Carolinians:
1. The State Board is already complying with state law, but the lawsuit ignores it.
The State Board of Elections is already administering the requirements of Senate Bill 747 (SB 747) as it pertains to jury information. Since the passage of SB 747 last fall, the State Board has been engaging with county court officials, county boards of elections, and the General Assembly in designing a system to implement these new requirements. Unlike nearly every other provision in SB 747, county court officials lobbied for a July 1, 2024 effective date for this portion of the law to allow time to build new systems necessary to implement the law, as required, across different state agencies. The NC GOP and RNC know of these efforts, and know the State Board has worked to implement the law as affirmed by Executive Director Karen Brinson Bell’s testimony at the NC General Assembly on July 23, 2024. But instead of providing solutions or necessary funding, they continue to cry wolf.
2. The lawsuit asks the State Board to violate federal law.
The National Voter Registration Act, a federal law, prohibits systematic removals of registered voters from the voter rolls within 90 days of an election (for this year, any time after August 7th). Nonetheless, the NC GOP and RNC request that the State Board of Elections conduct a systematic program of removing voters well after that deadline. The steps the lawsuit requests the State Board to take are prohibited by federal law – and the NC GOP and RNC know that.
3. The NC GOP and RNC has timed this lawsuit to maximize election disruption, voter confusion, and spread anti-immigrant hate.
The NC GOP is solely to blame for the State Board’s inability to implement this law in time for the 2024 General Election. The NC legislative majority wrote the law and set the timeline for implementation. This lawsuit was filed over a month after their last contact with the State Board and months after the State Board began trying to implement the law. If the NC GOP was truly concerned about safeguarding fair elections for all North Carolina voters, it had adequate time to work quickly to remedy any legal violations. Instead, the NC GOP waited until two months before the 2024 General Election.
So why file? Because this lawsuit is not designed to solve problems – it is designed to cause them.
This lawsuit is part of a nationwide campaign spearheaded by the RNC to file litigation that is foreclosed under longstanding principles of federal law. But they do not care — the RNC is not filing these lawsuits because they think they will win; they are filing these lawsuits despite knowing they will lose. The RNC intends to use those losses to amplify baseless conspiracy theories about how the election is being stolen and the courts will not stop it. This lawsuit is part and parcel of that effort — designed to undermine confidence in North Carolina elections.
But this particular lawsuit is even more dangerous, because it is also a part of an insidious national effort to spread anti-immigrant conspiracy theories in the hopes of short-term political gain in November. There is absolutely no evidence of widespread non-citizen voting affecting the outcome of our elections. State and federal law require all voters to affirm and verify their citizenship status when registering to vote, and North Carolina conducts multiple checks to ensure accurate election results. The suggestion that North Carolina’s elections are being manipulated by non-citizen voting is wholly unjustified.
We all believe that citizens should be able to freely participate in our democracy. We also know that immigrants–whether citizens or not–are valuable members of our communities, essential to our economy, and bring diverse perspectives to our state. This attempt to spread lies about widespread non-citizen voting casts doubt on our elections and villainizes members of our communities, our neighbors, only for political opportunism. It is another step in a campaign designed to create fear, spread hate, and discourage voters of all parties from exercising their fundamental right to vote.
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Southern Coalition for Social Justice, founded in 2007, partners with communities of color and economically disadvantaged communities in the South to defend and advance their political, social, and economic rights through the combination of legal advocacy, research, organizing, and communications. Learn more at southerncoalition.org and follow our work on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
Democracy North Carolina is a statewide nonpartisan organization that strengthens democratic structures, builds power among disenfranchised communities, and inspires confidence in a transformed political process that works for all. Learn more at www.democracync.org.
El Pueblo is a nonprofit organization based in Raleigh, NC, specializing in leadership development for both youth and adults among Wake County’s growing Latinx community.
NCAAT in Action is committed to supporting equity and justice for all by building political power among AAPIs (Asian American Pacific Islanders) and allies in North Carolina through voter education, progressive advocacy and leadership development.