![]() Stephanopoulos’ proposal at oral argument.) Among the many third parties ( amici) submitting their ideas to the Supreme Court, Harvard Law School’s Nicholas Stephanopoulos proposed a test that would apply similar standards as those used in other anti-discrimination contexts, such as Title VII. The petitioners propose stricter tests which require challengers to meet a higher bar before a court could invalidate a policy, including proving a substantial racial disparity and evaluating the impact in light of alternative voting options available to affected voters. The respondents essentially propose versions of the test used by the Ninth Circuit, which struck down the two policies after finding that they created a racially disparate impact on voters in light of the “totality of the circumstances” in Arizona. Enter: Brnovich.īoth sides in Brnovich propose their own versions of a vote denial test-that is, standards by which courts should assess whether an election policy denies the right to vote on the basis of race in violation of Section 2. While vote dilution has had standards for courts to apply when reviewing such claims, the Supreme Court has yet to provide standards for identifying and applying Section 2 in the vote denial context. After the loss of Section 5, however, voting rights advocates have explored Section 2’s application to vote denial, in order to potentially fill (at least part of) the void left by Shelby County. Until this point, Section 2 had primarily been used in the redistricting context to combat “vote dilution” using a standard of application developed by the Supreme Court’s Thornburg v. In 2013, the Supreme Court delivered its Shelby County decision, which invalidated the formula that determined which jurisdictions were subject to Section 5 preclearance requirements, effectively striking down the most effective tool against racially discriminatory election practices. Section 5 applied to states with a history of discrimination, and, in fact, Arizona’s ballot collection ban failed to obtain preclearance when it was first proposed by the state legislature in 2011. Under Section 5, policies such as those at issue here would need to be “precleared” by the U.S. Holder, the VRA’s most powerful tool was Section 5. ![]() Until 2013’s Supreme Court decision in Shelby County v. The VRA was passed by Congress in 1965 during the Civil Rights Movement, and subsequently renewed in 1970, 1975, 1982, 1992, and 2006. ![]() On an en banc (full court) appeal in the Ninth Circuit, however, the DNC prevailed in January 2020. which results in a denial or abridgement of the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color.”Īt trial, in 2018, the District Court for the District of Arizona ruled against the DNC and in favor of the defendants. In 2016, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and the Arizona Democratic Party challenged these two policies under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act (VRA), which prohibits any “standard, practice, or procedure. Challengers of this policy contend that, combined with Arizona’s tendency to frequently change precinct locations, it disproportionately impacts Latino and other minority voters in Arizona. The second policy at issue invalidates ballots cast in the wrong precinct, even if those ballots include votes for statewide races in which all Arizonans choose among the same candidates regardless of precinct location. ![]() Opponents of this law point to its especially detrimental effect on Native American voters, many of whom do not have access to reliable mail services in rural Arizona. The first is a ban on third-party ballot collection (referred to as “ ballot harvesting” by its critics), which effectively prohibits third-party collection and delivery of voters’ absentee ballots with limited exceptions. Voting rights advocates argue that these laws have the effect of denying minority voters the opportunity to vote. Democratic National Committee was argued in front of the high court’s Justices on Tuesday, March 2, 2021.īrnovich involves two electoral policies in Arizona, enacted by Republicans ostensibly to promote election security. Described as the Supreme Court’s “ chance to diminish the Voting Rights Act,” Brnovich v.
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