Just over a week before Election Day, Virginia filed an emergency appeal on late-Sunday, Oct. 27, for the United States Supreme Court to reinstate the removal of more than 1,600 voter registrations, whom it alleges are noncitizens, from voter rolls. The appeal follows lower court rulings that the state’s attempt to purge voter rolls 90 days before a federal election is illegal.
A federal judge ordered the names of those purged be reinstated on Friday, Oct. 25, and an appeals panel upheld the judge’s decision on Sunday, Oct. 27.
The rulings are a result of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) suing Virginia over the mass removal of voters earlier this year. The DOJ contended voters were wrongfully removed, sometimes by checking the wrong box on Department of Motor Vehicles records. Those were used to determine if voters were eligible under Virginia Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s executive order earlier this year.
The challenge to the law and order to restore voter registrations drew condemnation from Youngkin and former President Donald Trump. Trump praised Youngkin’s efforts to overturn the “illegal order,” while also petitioning for the U.S. Supreme Court to reinstate Youngkin’s executive order.
In his plea to the Supreme Court, Virginia’s attorney general argued “it should never be illegal to remove an illegal voter.”