Arizona laws challenged by voting rights groups reinstated

An Arizona law giving counties the ability to cancel a voter’s registration if the county learns the voter is registered elsewhere can be enforced, the Ninth Circuit ruled Friday.

Another Arizona provision making it a crime to provide a “voting facility” to a person registered in another state was also reinstated by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

The ruling overturned a lower court injunction suspending the provisions, which were enacted in 2022 and also temporarily banned that year.

The groups — Arizona Alliance for Retired Americans, Voto Latino and Priorities USA — failed to demonstrate the requisite harm to challenge the rescission provision, Judge Kenneth K. Lee said.

“With or without the rescission provision, plaintiffs can still register and educate voters – in other words, continue their core activities in which they have always been engaged,” Lee wrote.

And the crime provision is not unconstitutional because, read in the context of the rest of the law, the phrase “voting mechanism” would not encompass lawful voter mobilization activities, Lee said.

“We disagree with the district court’s conclusion that the phrase ‘voting mechanism’ in the crime provision is so vague that it would likely capture constitutionally protected activities such as voter outreach and registration,” the judge wrote.

Justice Daniel P. Collins joined the majority opinion.

Justice Jacqueline H. Nguyen, dissenting, said she would uphold the injunction against the rescission provision, finding that the majority’s analysis of admissibility was too narrow.

“Although plaintiffs could continue to register and educate voters without changing their practices in response to the rescission provision, the registrations would be inadequate and the education incomplete under plaintiffs’ view of the law,” Nguyen wrote.

Herrera Arellano LLP and Elias Law Group LLP represent the voting groups.

The case is Ariz. All. for Ret. Ams. v. Mayes, 9th Cir., No. 22-16490, 9/20/24.