A standard progressive claim is that the Left truly cares about democracy but the other side, not so much.
Yet the Biden-Harris White House is now suing my home state, Virginia, and our Republican governor, Glenn Youngkin, for simply following and appropriately enforcing a 2006 law meant to protect our voting rights. That measure was signed into law by Gov. Tim Kaine, a Democrat now seeking a third term in the U.S. Senate representing Virginia.
By undermining the security of our ballot box and the rule of law, the Biden-Harris administration is the true threat to democracy.
The law requires Virginia officials to remove noncitizens from the voter rolls, a process that starts with someone declaring themselves a noncitizen and then registering to vote.
It also requires Virginia to use data from the Department of Motor Vehicles to do so, a practice in place for 18 years. Democrat governors since Kaine, including Terry McAuliffe and Ralph Northam, used this process all the way through October in election years.
For the current election cycle, the commonwealth in recent months removed more than 6,300 noncitizens from the rolls so they couldn’t vote in the Nov. 5 general election.
Virginia has followed the prescribed process of notifying the elections registrar that noncitizens must be told that if they can’t affirm U.S. citizenship in 14 days, their names will be taken off the voter rolls.
It’s shocking that with less than 30 days until the election, the Biden-Harris Justice Department filed this unprecedented lawsuit.
“Virginians—and Americans—will see this for exactly what it is: a desperate attempt to attack the legitimacy of the elections in the commonwealth, the very crucible of American democracy,” Youngkin said in a public statement in response to the Justice Department’s suit.
“With the support of our [state] attorney general, we will defend these commonsense steps, [which] we are legally required to take, with every resource available to us,” the governor said. “Virginia’s election will be secure and fair, and I will not stand idly by as this politically motivated action tries to interfere in our elections, period.”
Article I, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution gives control of elections to state legislative branches, not to city workers or state or federal judges at the last minute. The 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause doesn’t allow the federal government to corrupt the integrity of elections in favor of noncitizens and in violation of the law.
In a Fox News interview, Youngkin said: “To me, this is unprecedented, and I think it represents a Department of Justice that is trying to achieve something other than fair and free elections.”
He’s right.
Youngkin vowed to battle on in the courts against the Biden-Harris administration. But the governor also is resisting progressives in Virginia who want to undermine the rule of law in voting.
Restoring Integrity and Trust in Elections, or RITE, a nonprofit voter-integrity organization, wrote Virginia elections officials to request immediate action to halt Democrat-leaning Prince William County from ignoring a state law that safeguards elections from noncitizen voting.
Under Virginia law, election officials must challenge any voter whom they suspect of not being a U.S. citizen. Challenged individuals may still vote if they sign a statement affirming, under oath, that they are U.S. citizens.
Recently, however, RITE noted that Prince William County published an operations manual that ignores this requirement. The county manual directs election officials to allow those who present so-called Driver Privilege Cards—or DPCs, which are issued exclusively to noncitizens—to vote without challenge so long as they also present another form of identification.
This is blatant disregard for the law.
Someone with a Driver Privilege Card gives ample evidence of being a noncitizen because only noncitizens may receive a DPC.
So Restoring Integrity and Trust in Elections requested that Virginia election officials correct the situation in Prince William County by notifying the county of its obligation to challenge voters who present DPCs.
“The Youngkin administration has made great progress in protecting Virginia’s elections from noncitizen voting,” said Derek Lyons, the organization’s president and CEO. “Undertaking the actions RITE has requested would further this work and give the commonwealth’s citizens even more reason to have faith and trust in this year’s elections.”
As a voter, homeowner, and taxpayer who was born in Virginia, I couldn’t be more proud of my governor for standing up to the tyranny of President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and other progressives in defense of the U.S. Constitution, the Virginia Constitution, and the rule of law.
Carrie Sheffield is a senior policy analyst at Independent Women’s Voice.
We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal.
