A federal judge on Wednesday temporarily blocked Alabama’s voter removal program that flagged thousands of registered voters and accused them of illegally registering in the state.
The Justice Department sued the state of Alabama challenging the program aimed at removing voters from its election rolls, arguing it was too close to the Nov. 5 election.
The office of Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen, a Republican, had referred to the program as “strategic efforts” to “remove noncitizens registered to vote” from the state’s voter rolls.
But the federal law known as the National Voter Registration Act bans states from systematically removing people from their lists of registered voters within 90 days of a federal election, also known as the “quiet period” before Election Day.
Allen announced a process for purging 3,251 registered Alabama voters in August, 84 days before Election Day.
In addition, those 3,251 voters were referred to the state attorney general’s office for criminal prosecution, and it has already been determined that some of those referred were wrongly accused.
In the decision, U.S. District Judge Anna Manasco, who was nominated by former President Donald Trump in 2020, ruled that the state violated the National Voter Registration Act’s “quiet period” provision and ordered Allen to pause the voter removal program through the election.
“This year, Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen (1) blew the deadline when he announced a purge program to begin eighty-four days before the 2024 General Election, (2) later admitted that his purge list included thousands of United States citizens (in addition to far fewer noncitizens, who are ineligible to vote), and (3) in any event, referred everyone on the purge list to the Alabama Attorney General for criminal investigation,” Manasco wrote in the court order.
“As part of this program, they were all reported to Alabama’s chief law enforcement authority for criminal investigation,” said Manasco, adding that “as far as I know nothing has been done to undo that.”
Manasco ordered the state to contact all 3,251 people to let them know they are still eligible to vote, assuming they don’t violate any other laws that would prevent them from being able to.
The case is among several instances of voter purges in Republican-led states ahead of this fall’s presidential election.
The Justice Department also sued the state of Virginia on Friday for a similar program authorized by Gov. Glenn Youngkin.
The Justice Department asked a federal judge to order the state to restore the registrations of voters who have been dropped from the rolls since Aug. 7. It also asked the judge to require training of local officials and poll workers to prevent confusion about eligible voters’ being accused of being noncitizens.
Youngkin signed an executive order Aug. 7 to compare daily the list of people who identified as noncitizens at the Department of Motor Vehicles with the list of registered voters.
Local registrars were then told to notify anyone selected for cancellation of their registrations to affirm their citizenship within 14 days. If the voters didn’t respond by that deadline, they would be removed from the registration rolls.
The Justice Department lawsuit said it has already been determined that legal voters were mistakenly purged from the voter rolls.
