In the Press

“We can make no presumptions about the reasons either way,” said Orion Danjuma, counsel at the advocacy group Protect Democracy.

“This is an example of a classic shadow docket decision,” Danjuma said, referring to criticism of an emergency docket almost exclusively reserved for last-minute death penalty appeals. The court’s shadow docket rulings expanded during the Trump administration, as the justices acted quickly to resurrect executive policies struck down by federal judges.

There’s “no reason to understand why the court is making its decision,” Danjuma said, and therefore “no logic to suggest that it was proper.”

Protect Democracy, a nonprofit founded by two lawyers who worked in President Barack Obama’s administration, said in an email Tuesday that the new processes are laying the groundwork to overturn election results.

Protect Democracy, one of the groups behind the initial lawsuit filed against Virginia to halt the removal of “noncitizens” from the voter rolls, criticized the ruling, sticking by their claim that the voter-purge program was “illegal.”

“Despite clear law and undisputed evidence that the program removes eligible U.S. citizens from the rolls, the Supreme Court overturned two carefully reasoned federal court rulings in our lawsuit challenging Virginia’s illegal voter-purge program,” Aaron Baird, spokesperson for the group, told The Center Square. “The Court majority – over the public dissent of three Justices – offered no reasoning for its decision. As a result, Virginia will not have to reinstate purged eligible voters because of SCOTUS’s decision.”

“We know this program removes eligible voters,” said Protect Democracy, a non-profit that sued Virginia over the removals, in a statement. “Virginia has not presented any evidence of noncitizens participating in elections. Because there is none. And it’s actually eligible VA voters that have been caught in the middle of this election-subversion scheme.”

Orion Danjuma, counsel with Protect Democracy, noted how a similar situation was also recently settled in Alabama. A federal judge blocked Alabama’s voter roll purge program after the Department of Justice had filed a similar suit last month as it did to Virginia. When Virginia requested its stay to the U.S. Supreme Court, Alabama’s Attorney General signed onto an amicus brief in support of the request.

Danjuma stressed that the programs “disenfranchise eligible voters” and that organizations like his will continue to challenge them.

“While this is a serious setback to voters for this election, we want to make clear that we will be continuing to expose problems with the state’s program so that they can be corrected in the future,” he said.

Protect Democracy, one of the groups that brought the lawsuit, cited media interviews with other voters as showing that the Youngkin administration’s purge has removed U.S. citizens from the voter rolls.

So why continue to push this anti-immigrant conspiracy theory if it’s so easily disproved?

Because Trump wants to “create a socialized lie” to make it easier to challenge the 2024 election results, said Anna Dorman, an attorney with the nonpartisan group Protect Democracy.

“They repeat it again and again and again to create this sense in the public that there’s some sort of ‘there, there.’ That there’s some sort of problem,” she said.