Judicial Watch Joins Allied Educational Foundation to ask SCOTUS to Uphold Arizona’s Electoral Integrity Laws

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today it joined with Allied Educational Foundation (AEF) to file an amici curiae (friends of the court) brief in the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold Arizona’s electoral integrity laws that prohibit out-of-precinct voting and ballot harvesting. The amici brief was submitted in the case Mark Brnovich, Attorney General of Arizona, et al. v. Democratic National Committee, et al. (Nos. 19-1257 & 1258), coming on appeal from the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Initially, a Ninth Circuit panel of judges affirmed the district court ruling upholding Arizona’s election integrity laws that prohibit out-of-precinct voting and ballot harvesting, but then the full appeals court overturned the district court ruling. The Ninth Circuit held that Arizona’s prohibition on out-of-precinct voting and third-party collection and delivery of early ballots (ballot harvesting) were enacted with a discriminatory purpose and had discriminatory results, in violation of Section 2 of the National Voting Rights Act (NVRA). The Supreme Court granted a writ of certiorari to hear the appeal on April 27, 2020.

The Judicial Watch/AEF brief explains that in applying the Voting Rights Act:

[C]ourts ask whether the evidence indicates that the challenged voting procedures have caused minority voters to have less opportunity to participate in the political process and to elect representatives of their choice. Respondents utterly failed to adduce any evidence that satisfied this … requirement of causation, i.e., that the challenged voting procedure caused minorities to have less opportunity to participate in the political process and to elect representatives of their choice.

“This Supreme Court case highlights how leftist partisans would misuse civil rights laws to undermine election integrity measures, such as a ban on ballot harvesting, that are race neutral,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. The Allied Educational Foundation is a charitable and educational foundation dedicated to improving the quality of life through education. In furtherance of that goal, the Foundation has engaged in a number of projects, which include, but are not limited to, educational and health conferences domestically and abroad. AEF has partnered frequently with Judicial Watch to fight government and judicial corruption and to promote a return to ethics and morality in the nation’s public life. In 2020, Judicial Watch sued North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Colorado for failing to clean their voter rolls, and sued Illinois for refusing to disclose voter roll data in violation of federal law. These lawsuits are ongoing. Judicial Watch also has several dozen open records requests pending over the conduct of the 2020 election. You can learn more about Judicial Watch’s clean election efforts here.