Judge rules in favor of Georgia voter citizenship requirements

Directed verdict issued after plaintiffs rested their case.

A federal judge upheld Georgia’s citizenship verification requirements for new Americans, dismissing the case midway through the trial Thursday after three days of testimony.

U.S. District Judge Eleanor Ross granted a directed verdict in court, finding that the plaintiffs failed to prove that the voting rights of naturalized citizens are violated when they have to show papers or get a new state ID before they can vote.

The quick ruling brings an abrupt end to a lawsuit that has been pending since 2018 over state laws that prevent new citizens from casting ballots until they show that they’re eligible.

Attorneys for Georgia said in court this week that citizenship checks are needed to prevent the possibility of illegal voting. Zero noncitizens have voted in recent elections, according to a 2022 audit by the secretary of state’s office.

“Ensuring that only U.S. citizens vote in our elections is critically important to secure and accurate elections,” said Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, the defendant in the case. “Georgia’s citizenship verification process is common sense, and it works. With this ruling, we are able to continue ensuring that only U.S. citizens are voting in our elections.”

An attorney for the voting rights groups that had sued said voters should ensure their registrations are active and valid.

“We’re very disappointed in the outcome of the trial,” said Julie Houk, an attorney for the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, which represented plaintiffs including the Georgia Coalition for the People’s Agenda. “We encourage anyone who ... hasn’t had an opportunity to be put in active status on the voter rolls to immediately take steps to change that” by contacting their county elections office.

During this week’s trial, witnesses included three voters who said they had to jump through hoops before they were allowed to vote.

But the defense showed that all of those voters were eventually able to vote after they overcame hurdles to registering with county election officials who didn’t properly process citizenship paperwork.

Ross, an appointee of President Barack Obama, found Georgia’s elections are open to all citizens and that the state has an interest in ensuring that only citizens are allowed to vote.

All Georgia voters must show ID before they can cast a ballot in each election.

The voting rights groups that sued had asked Ross to order election officials to stop labeling new citizens as “pending” voters until they showed documentation, instead making them active voters automatically.

Ross rejected that proposal, issuing her ruling after the plaintiffs rested their case and before the defense presented a single witness.

One witness for the plaintiffs, Tamieka Atkins of the voting rights group ProGeorgia, testified that new Georgians shouldn’t have to go through extra steps to prove themselves before they can participate in democracy.

“Recently naturalized citizens shouldn’t be treated differently from natural-born U.S. citizens,” Atkins testified Monday. “The burden shouldn’t be on newly naturalized citizens.”

New citizens must either provide naturalization documents with their voter registration application, send papers to election offices, show citizenship information when they vote or present proof within three days of an election.

They can also pay $32 to update their driver’s licenses to reflect that they have become U.S. citizens and then re-register to vote.

The plaintiffs argued that Georgia’s citizenship verification process violated protections against discrimination in the U.S. Constitution, the Voting Rights Act and the National Voter Registration Act.

There’s no government system that automatically informs election officials when a Georgia resident earns citizenship.

The secretary of state’s office has previously said it would routinely verify voters’ citizenship status by the end of last year, but that system still hasn’t been put in place.

The ruling is the latest decision upholding Georgia’s voting laws in recent years, but it’s the first ruling that came in the middle of a trial.

U.S. District Judge Steve Jones ruled against Fair Fight, the voting group that Democrat Stacey Abrams founded, in its 2018 lawsuit that opposed Georgia’s voting laws. Jones also upheld a Republican redistricting plan in December. A different judge hasn’t yet issued a decision after an election security trial in January.

The first trial over Georgia’s 2021 voting law is scheduled to begin Monday, dealing with a provision of the law that restricts nonprofit organizations from mass mailing absentee ballot applications to voters.

U.S. District Judge Eleanor Ross