DOJ sues Virginia over voter roll purge
Last edited Sat Oct 12, 2024, 06:11 PM - Edit history (1)
Source: The Hill
10/11/24 7:25 PM ET
The Department of Justice (DOJ) announced a lawsuit against the state of Virginia for purging voter rolls on Friday. The department claims state officials violated the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA) by challenging voters’ eligibility too close to the November election.
“As the National Voter Registration Act mandates, officials across the country should take heed of the law’s crystal clear and unequivocal restrictions on systematic list maintenance efforts that fall within 90 days of an election,” said Kristen Clarke, assistant attorney general in the Civil Rights Division.
In early August, Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R-Va.) signed an executive order confirming there were “daily” updates to the voter list. These updates included “compar[ing] the list of individuals who have been identified as non-citizens” by the State Department of Motor Vehicles “to the list of existing registered voters.” Local registrars were then required to contact challenged voters to inform them they were “pending cancellation” unless they “affirm their citizenship” within 14 days.
DOJ said the process led to some Virginians’ voter registration being cancelled. “Systematic removal programs are more error-prone than other forms of list maintenance, and eligible voters placed on the path to removal days or weeks before Election Day may be deterred from voting or unable to participate in the election on the same terms that they would have but for the Commonwealth’s error,” read the legal filing.
Read more: https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/4929789-doj-sues-virginia-voter-rolls/
ETA - adding link to DOJ SUIT (PDF) - https://www.democracydocket.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/12024-10-11-Complaint.pdf
= new reply since forum marked as read
There is a lot of "sincere ignorance" here when it comes to "Civics 101" and how the government is structured, what the ROLES of each Branch ARE, and how they inter-operate.
The continued drumbeat that blames the EXECUTIVE BRANCH for JUDICIAL BRANCH actions is tiring. It continues to promote Democrats going "extra-judicial" by "locking people up" and fuck the court rulings that unfortunately have intervened to "delay justice".
I saw the same bullshit hurled at Eric Holder when people here demanded that he unilaterally lock Shrub and his criminal cabal up "right fucking now!!!11!!!!!" and because he didn't, he should have been fired.
Every time someone posts an OP that says "Garland should lock (fill in the blank) up" is just one example.
Every news story that indicates a COURT RULING that throws something out or delays something, the action instead gets blamed on Garland. 
It's literally this idiotic Garland Derangement Syndrome. It wastes a lot of time from actual prosecutorial strategy discussions and completely allows the courts to escape scot-free from any critique other than the simplistic "well it's Alito and Thomas..." dismissiveness. It essentially magnifies a lot of misinformation which fuels torches and pitchforks hurled against Democrats instead of Republicans.
The Department of Justice has 115,000 employees who work for MANY DIFFERENT AGENCIES that DO DIFFERENT THINGS. The entire 115,000 person workforce is NOT designed to be DU's special prosecutorial team devoted to 45 and his criminal enterprise.
I keep telling people these Department heads are really just figureheads who are only there temporarily until the next administration or they decide to leave earlier. But DU must have its "boogeyman" and unfortunately a Democrat is made an equal to the true evil boogeyman - 45. It's just silly.
Yet there is a clear lack of understanding about the roles of the "Executive Branch" and the "Judicial Branch" that is evident.
That is what should happen. But when the Executive does their part and it lands into the judicial branch to be halted, it still ends up becoming the twisted pretzel logic of being the Executive Branch's "fault" for (fill in the blank reason and add Garland's name for good measure).
https://www.justice.gov/jm/jm-9-2000-authority-us-attorney-criminal-division-mattersprior-approvals#9-2.400
A "preliminary inquiry of what" if at the time of signing the E.O., there was no evidence (AT THAT TIME) that any names were actually illegally purged?
That's federal "harassment", something that 45 has PROMISED will happen if he is elected to office.
What you see in the actual FILING (linked in the OP comments) is that EVIDENCE WAS GATHERED to establish the "whos", "whats", "wheres", "whens", and apparent "whys", so that they could SHOW that there may have been a violation. Otherwise you are wasting FTE time trying to speculate on whether something is going to happen (because purges ARE ALLOWED if someone asks to be removed within that time frame, as an example of an exception to the federal law) - especially when you have states routinely updating, correcting, and purging their voter rolls all year.
Again the problem here is that you are insisting on a "preemptive" actions - BEFORE anything is shown to have happened.
Right now the fact that something was done AFTER it happened makes what you wrote moot.
Did you read the lawsuit that was linked upthread? I just added it to the OP comments. I am including below -
The argument that keeps being brought up is some kind of "delay" in DOJ responding to some perceived "wrong" and that basically promotes the idea of a massive "Big Brother" operation.
What? Every federal government agency has governing principles, processes, procedures, and guidelines that are standard across the country. The statutes are published in the CFR. What you wrote makes no sense.
Have you ever worked for the federal government in any capacity (civilian, military, contractor)?
??? Wow.
I don't think you understand what you linked to.
But let me give you a parallel example (I posted the below at the end of last month in another thread and I will update my final "quesiton" at the bottom of it) - https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1014&pid=3315510
===============
In GA, Fani Willis won her election to be Fulton County, GA D.A. in Nov. 2020 and took office in Jan. 2021. About a month or so later she began the investigation in her RICO case.
(snip)
Feb. 10, 2021
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis notifies Kemp that her office has launched an investigation into efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the results of the 2020 election, according to a letter obtained by ABC News.
The letter asked state officials to preserve any documents potentially related to the 2020 general election, "with particular care given to set aside and preserve those that may be evidence of attempts to influence the actions of persons who were administering" it, which would include Trump's phone call with Raffensperger.
Jan. 20, 2022
Willis requests to seat a special grand jury in her probe, according to a letter obtained by ABC News. In the letter to Fulton County Chief Judge Christopher Brasher, Willis wrote that the move is needed because "a significant number of witnesses and prospective witnesses have refused to cooperate with the investigation absent a subpoena requiring their testimony."
(snip)
July 11, 2023
Based on the findings of the special grand jury, Willis empanels a new grand jury to weight possible election-related charges against Trump.
(snip)
And one month after the above, on Aug. 15, 2023, Willis announced her indictments - Trump and 18 allies charged in Georgia election meddling as former president faces 4th criminal case
QUESTION
Today is October 12, 2024. Where is her case and why isn't 45 in state prison in Georgia?
ANSWER
The JUDGE tossed out some more charges exactly one month ago to the day - Judge tosses more counts against Trump and others in Georgia election case, 32 counts remain
Point being as I said, the JUDICIARY is holding up ALL of the criminal cases (whether for trial or for sentencing).
Summary - https://www.democracydocket.com/cases/virginia-noncitizen-voter-purge-program-challenge-doj/
Here it is (PDF) - https://www.democracydocket.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/12024-10-11-Complaint.pdf
No one can "take action" BEFORE THE FACT.
If an E.O. was signed on that "90 days before" date (in this case August 7, 2024) yet no names had been purged on that date, then anyone filing suit at that time would be laughed out of court with the suit denied/dismissed because nothing had happened yet.
Pages #7 - #9 actually establish the evidence that shows when the purges actually began (and how many and by who). They also determined what actual procedures occured once the notifications and purges started and found those procedures also violated the law and they had to BRING THE RECEIPTS to prove it in order to file.
That is what happened when a number of entities had filed suit against TX with their "Abortion bounty" idiocy, where the lawsuits were denied and the SCOTUS eventually delayed their intervention long enough for that particular law to go into effect - https://www.scotusblog.com/2021/09/supreme-court-leaves-texas-abortion-ban-in-place/
Texas abortion providers went to federal court in July, seeking to block it before its Sept. 1 effective date. They argued (among other things) that the law violates their patients’ constitutional right to end a pregnancy before viability. When the district court denied the defendants’ motion to dismiss the case on Aug. 25, things moved quickly. The defendants went to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, which granted their request to put the remaining district-court proceedings, including an Aug. 30 hearing on the abortion providers’ request for a preliminary injunction, on hold. The court of appeals also denied the abortion providers’ request to fast-track the defendants’ appeal, prompting the providers to seek emergency relief in the Supreme Court on Monday afternoon.
(snip)
Hearsay.
The point is the DATES and actual execution of the violation, NOT claiming you are "going to do something".
They have to actually PROVE, beyond a reasonable doubt, WHAT was done, WHEN it was done, and what statutes those actions were violating, meaning they had to gather those transcripts of meetings/hearings to confirm it.
(and yes as a federal lab worker, I had "evidence development" courses because by golly, like almost every federal agency, we had to carefully prepare and submit our stuff ( "evidence" ) to DOJ so that they could take it from there to court)
For what reason? "Suspicion?
That would be "harassment" if nothing had actually happened yet.
This is what I'm talking about when one brings up "oligarchy" and even more specifically, the "unitary executive". It is exactly how the government is NOT supposed to work, and for a reason.
I am sure there is plenty in Project 2025 that goes into how to do all that however, because that is their plan.
I'm afraid that "opinion" without "evidence" in a court of law, won't fly. Ask 45's Kraken lawyers. A Dictatorship is the goal for those loons but it should NOT be the goal of Democrats.
(2)(A) A State shall complete, not later than 90 days prior
to the date of a primary or general election for Federal office,
any program the purpose of which is to systematically remove
the names of ineligible voters from the official lists of eligible
voters.
(B) Subparagraph (A) shall not be construed to preclude—
(i) the removal of names from official lists of voters on
a basis described in paragraph (3) (A) or (B) or (4KA) of sub-
section (a); or
(ii) correction of registration records pursuant to this Act.
(snip)
Within that law are the examples of when purging is okay (notably if a voter contacts the election office and indicates they have moved as an example).
When and how each state does this is up to the state but they have to work within the confines of federal law and establish that the reason.
For example in an OP about the same similar culling of the rolls - https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143313603
NC had this info (that was tracked on Mark Elias' Democracy Docket) -
This has some details on what NC did - https://www.democracydocket.com/news-alerts/north-carolina-election-boards-remove-over-700000-ineligible-voters/
If VA can't show that who they purged fits the lawful (federal law) requirement (regardless of party), then evidence of that needed to be confirmed, and further legal action taken, which is apparently what has happened for this VA situation.
What often happens is that there are a number of voting rights/civil rights groups that promote and carry out registrations and they monitor this. And if a voter who might have signed up that way finds they were suddenly no longer on the registration list, then they often contact those orgs that signed them up, who can then follow-through and double-check. And if they find shenanigans going on, they will often make attempts to rectify it, and even file suit themselves if there was no good reason for the purge, and they will also notify DOJ.
