Brnovich v. Democratic National Committee

Brnovich v. Democratic National Committee, 594 U.S. 647 (2021), was a United States Supreme Court case related to voting rights established by the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA), and specifically the applicability of Section 2's general provision barring discrimination against minorities in state and local election laws in the wake of the 2013 Supreme Court decision _Shelby County v. Holder _, which effectively removed the requirement that jurisdictions covered under Section 4(b) get preclearance to change their election procedures. Brnovich v. Democratic National Committee involved two of Arizona's election policies: one outlawing ballot collection and another banning out-of-precinct voting. The Supreme Court ruled in a 6–3 decision in July 2021 that neither of Arizona's election policies violated the VRA or had a racially discriminatory purpose.

Contents

• 1 Background

• 2 Lower courts

  • 2.1 Ninth Circuit

• 3 Supreme Court

  • 3.1 Appeal

  • 3.2 Oral arguments

  • 3.3 Decision

  • 3.4 Dissent

• 4 Reactions

• 5 Impact

• 6 See also

• 7 Notes

• 8 References

• 9 External links

Background

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The Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA) was one of the most significant pieces of legislation to protect voter rights for minorities by prohibiting discriminatory voting practices and providing federal oversight of jurisdictions with histories of racial discrimination in voting. Passed during the civil rights movement , the VRA has been amended several times since passage and has seen a body of case law develop at Supreme Court related to its various provisions and amendments. Generally, the VRA has been upheld five times as constitutional.

However, in a 5–4 decision in _Shelby County v. Holder _ (2013), the Supreme Court effectively eliminated VRA's Section 5 "preclearance" requirement, which had mandated state and local governments in 15 states (those with a past history of voting rights violations) to seek permission from a federal court or the US Justice Department before making significant changes to voting laws. The majority in Shelby County held that Section 4(b)'s coverage formula, which had been last amended by Congress in 1975, was "unconstitutional in light of current conditions" and "based on decades-old data and eradicated practices."

The Supreme Court's decision left it to Congress to amend Section 4(b)'s coverage formula, but until Congress does so, Section 5's preclearance mandate is no longer valid law.

Shelby County, by eliminating the preclearance requirements, allowed certain state and local governments to freely pass voting laws without first seeking permission from the Federal courts or the U.S. Justice Department. A number of states passed new election laws ahead of the 2016 United States elections , which included the 2016 United States presidential election between the Republican candidate, Donald Trump , and the Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton . While some laws were passed to support improved voting access recommendations from the Presidential Commission on Election Administration under Barack Obama , other laws were passed, particularly in states with conservative leadership, which required stricter identification checks for voting and shifted and reduced early voting periods, among other measures.

Lower courts

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The case primarily dealt with two election-related policies in Arizona

challenged under the Fifteenth Amendment and Section 2 of the VRA, one being passed after Shelby County:

1. An existing out-of-precinct policy from 1970 requiring election officials to reject ballots placed by voters that vote in the wrong precinct
2. The new law, passed in 2016 as Arizona H.B. 2023 by the Republican-controlled Arizona State Legislature , making it a felony for anyone other than an election official or a family member or caregiver to handle or to collect a completed early voting or absentee ballot.

H.B. 2023 thus banned ballot collection , a practice critics call "ballot harvesting." Arizona Governor Doug Ducey , a Republican, signed the bill into law and framed the legislation as similar to measures in 18 other states. Democratic lawmakers in Arizona questioned the lack of evidence related to voting fraud used to back the bill's passage.

Ahead of the election, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) sued and challenged both policies. The DNC claimed that Arizona's policy to reject ballots cast in the wrong precinct violated the First and Fourteenth Amendments related to voters' rights. The DNC further stated that H.B. 2023 violated the Fifteenth Amendment and Section 2 of the VRA, which states, "No voting qualification or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or procedure shall be imposed or applied by any State or political subdivision to deny or abridge the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color." The DNC argued that the legislation directly discriminated against the state's Hispanic , African American , and Native American population. The DNC contended that the state legislature had purposely created H.B. 2023 to discriminate against minority voters by making it "particularly burdensome" for voters in counties with larger minority populations to vote, such as in Maricopa County , as they generally had fewer or no in-person voting locations.

The DNC initially sought a preliminary injunction to prevent Arizona from enforcing these laws and policy ahead of the 2016 election. The U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona denied the injunction but was reversed on appeal to an _en banc _ panel at the Ninth Circuit fou

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