Arizona voters passed Proposition 200 in 2004 to require proof of citizenship to register to vote, yesterday Arizona’s Attorney General argued in defense of their choice in front of the U.S. Supreme Court.
In yesterday’s hearing, Horne argued that the state is not preempted from requesting additional information about citizenship from applicants using a federal voter registration form, so long as the state only requires applicants to submit additional information, not an additional form.
Justices Sotomayor asked why the issue of proof of citizenship was a matter open to states when the federal form takes measures to address it. “Why would you think that Congress, in doing the short form registration, didn’t consider the issue of fraud, and decide that it had arrived at the balance it wanted?”
Horne said that when states “accept and use” the federal registration form, they are not precluded from seeking more information to facilitate that use; and though the commission that creates the federal form “may require only” information essential to allow states to determine voter eligibility, the phrase doesn’t preclude the commission from requiring less information than necessary to allow states to make that determination.”
Justice Scalia asked Horne why he is challenging Arizona’s right to require more information instead of challenging the fed’s form. Other states have additional registration requirements that have been included as official addendums to the federal form, but former Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard failed to act when the Election Assistance Commission took no action after a vote of 2-2 on whether it should be included, according to the Yellow Sheet.
Scalia said, “And you did nothing more about that? You didn’t go to court to say you have to include this as one of the state-specific requirements. Why didn’t you do that?” Horne responded that the decision to do nothing was made by Goddard. To which Scalia responded, “Oh. Okay. Why didn’t he do it?”
According to various news sources the Court seemed divided along ideological lines. According to Bloomberg News, “justices Kagan, Sotomayor and Ginsburg seemed to come down against the Arizona law in their comments, justices Scalia, Kennedy and Breyer asked questions of both sides “leaving the outcome in doubt.”
The Miami Herald reported that “Kennedy, who is often a swing vote, at times came down on Arizona’s side, with comments like, “The state has a very strong and vital interest in the integrity of its election . . . perhaps especially when those are elections of federal officials.”