Judicial Watch Victory: Court of Appeals Adopts Judicial Watch/AEF Argument to Uphold Alabama Photo Voter ID Law

[Geee]

Judicial Watch

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch today announced that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit adopted the argument put forth by Judicial Watch and Allied Educational Foundation (AEF) in their amici curiae briefwhen it upheld Alabama’s 2011 Photo Voter Identification Law. The court ruled the law does not violate the 14^th or 15^th Amendments or the Voting Rights Act and that the anti-voter ID plaintiffs failed to demonstrate the Alabama law causes the denial or abridgment of the right to vote on account of race.

The appellate panel majority found:

The burden of providing a photo ID…in order to vote is a minimal burden on Alabama’s voters—especially when Alabama accepts so many different forms of photo ID and makes acquiring one simple and free for voters who lack a valid ID but wish to obtain one.

The Circuit Court’s ruling affirmed a lower-court ruling in Greater Birmingham Ministries, et al. v. Secretary of State of Alabama (2:15-cv-02193), in which the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama upheld the Alabama Voter Photo ID Law in a decision handed down January 10, 2018. When the plaintiffs appealed the ruling, Judicial Watch, in conjunction with AEF, filed an amici curiae brief supporting the Act’s constitutionality.