With less than a month before the Nov. 4 midterm elections, voting laws in eight states are being challenged in state and federal courts, often going all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. These recent court challenges are due, for the most part, to varying state interpretations of two Supreme Court decisions in recent years. In 2008, the high court ruling in Crawford v. Marion County Election Board upheld an Indiana law requiring voters to provide photo IDs at the polls on Election Day. The high court’s 2013 ruling in Shelby County v. Holder blocked two provisions of the Voting Rights Act: Section 5, which required select states and local governments to obtain federal preclearance before implementing any changes to their voting laws or practices; and Section 4(b), which contained the coverage formula that determined which select jurisdictions were subjected to preclearance based on its voting discrimination history. This eCademy session will shed light on several recent voting law challenges across the country and how these cases may impact the states in November and beyond.
Presenters:
Rick Hasen
Professor of Law and Political Science
University of California at Irvine