April 24 (UPI) — Voters won’t have to provide proof of citizenship to register to vote in U.S. elections while a federal court challenge continues.
U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly on Thursday granted a preliminary injunction motion to temporarily stop the federal government from requiring would-be voters to show proof of citizenship when registering to vote.
“Our Constitution entrusts Congress and the states — not the president — with the authority to regulate federal elections,” Kollar-Kotelly wrote.
“Congress is currently debating legislation that would effect many of the changes the president purports to order,” she said.
“No statutory delegation of authority to the executive branch permits the president to short-circuit Congress’s deliberative process by executive order.”
Kollar-Kotelly issued a preliminary injunction against enforcing the proof-of-citizenship requirement when registering to vote while the court case proceeds.
The case combines three separate legal challenges to the proof-of-citizenship requirement filed by the Democratic National Committee, the League of United Latin American Citizens, the League of Women Voters Education Fund and others and naming President Donald Trump and his administration as defendants.
Officials with two plaintiff organizations lauded Kollar-Kotelly’s ruling on the preliminary injunction motion.
“The court’s decision today provides crucial protections for eligible voters and the organizations that help them register to vote,” officials for the American Civil Liberties Union and the League of Women Voters said Thursday in a joint statement.
“Millions of U.S. citizens lack easy access to a passport or other documents proving citizenship, and that shouldn’t interfere with their ability to register to vote,” the joint statement says.
“The president’s attempted takeover of federal elections is a blatant overreach to seize power that doesn’t belong to him,” the joint statement continues.
“The president lacks [the] authority to rewrite the country’s election rules on his own by weaponizing an independent, bipartisan commission to harm eligible voters.”
President Donald Trump on March 25 signed an executive order requiring proof of citizenship via a birth certificate or passport when registering to vote.
Congress also is considering the proposed Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act that would require individuals to provide proof of citizenship when registering to vote in federal elections.
