Arizona Court Says Nearly 100k People with Unconfirmed Citizenship Can Vote

Arizona’s highest court has ruled that nearly 100,000 residents who have unconfirmed citizenship status are allowed to vote in state and local elections.
The ruling on Friday was issued a few days after state officials announced that they had discovered an error in their database that monitors voters’ citizenship status. Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes, a Democrat, said on Tuesday that the error was resolved but that 98,000 voters impacted by the error were still in limbo.
Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer, a Republican, filed special action on Tuesday asking the Arizona Supreme Court to weigh in on the impacted voters’ status. The court ruled Friday that those without confirmed citizenship documents can still vote at the state and local levels in the fall.
Justices on the state’s highest court agreed with Fontes’ argument that not allowing voters who believed they had satisfied citizenship requirements would raise equal protection and due process concerns, according to a report from the Associated Press (AP). Arizona’s Supreme Court also noted that there was only a short time before the November 5 general election for the impacted voters to resolve any issues.
“We are unwilling on these facts to disenfranchise voters en masse from participating in state contests,” Chief Justice Ann Scott Timmer stated in the ruling, per the AP’s report.
Fontes celebrated the court’s ruling in a post to X, formerly Twitter, on Friday evening, writing: “We won.”
“No voters on ‘the list’ will be made Fed-Only,” the secretary of state wrote. “Congrats team. Thank you amici. Now … let’s go have an election!!”
Richer, despite disagreeing with Fontes on how the voters’ status should be held, also thanked the state’s highest court for its “extremely quick and professional review of this matter” in a post to X on Friday. He also thanked Fontes “for your partnership on this.”
“[Arizona] Supreme Court ruled for defendant (Fontes),” Richer wrote in his post. “The 100k registrants will continue to vote a full ballot this election. Thank God.”
Arizona has required residents to provide proof of U.S. citizenship to vote in state and local elections since 2005. Those who do not satisfy the requirements are registered as “federal only” voters, meaning they can only cast ballots in presidential and congressional elections.
Under state law, Arizona considers a driver’s license issued after October 1996 to be valid proof of citizenship. The state’s database error involved voters who obtained licenses before 1996, impacting nearly 2.5 percent of all registered voters.
AP reported that the majority of the affected voters reside in Maricopa County and are longtime residents, from 45 to 60 years old. Around 37 percent are registered Republicans while 27 percent are registered Democrats. The rest are registered as independents or under minor political parties.
The Arizona Republican Party filed an amicus brief earlier in the week with the state Supreme Court, arguing that it would be a breach of the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) to remove the impacted voters so close to an election.
“Nearly 100,000 Arizona voters should not be penalized for a mistake made by the government,” state GOP chair Gina Swoboda said in a statement to Newsweek on Thursday.
Update 09/20/24, 11:25 p.m. ET: This article has been updated with additional information and background.