A coalition of voting rights groups on Friday sued the Alabama secretary of state and attorney general over a policy they say illegally targets naturalized citizens to keep them from voting in the upcoming November election.
The lawsuit alleges that a recent policy intended to remove noncitizens from Alabama’s voter rolls “undermines the fundamental right to vote” by relying on faulty information that discriminates against naturalized citizens, disenfranchises eligible voters, and wrongly refers cases for criminal prosecution.
“Alabama is targeting its growing immigrant population through a voter purge intended to intimidate and disenfranchise naturalized citizens,” the lawsuit said.
We should start enshrining voters rights in such a way that tampering with them is seen as treasonous.
Among other things, we need to ascribe financial penalties to states that wrongfully remove people from voter rolls. States can rightfully remove people who die, move away, or are not citizens from voter rolls. However, there is no consequence to states for making a mistake. This encourages bad actors to deliberately be sloppy in their roll-clearing efforts, and it provides cover for purges based on race and ethnicity.
There need to be damages associated with removing someone from the rolls incorrectly. We should pass a federal law that establishes a new cause of action for such civil rights violations. Were you incorrectly removed from the voter rolls? You should be able to sue your state in federal court, for say, $100k plus attorney’s fees, for violation of your civil rights. States can either be deliberate and careful about their voter rolls maintenance, or they can be driven to insolvency.
And tie the value to buying power in some way. 100k when I was a kid is much different than 100k today. We want to have the same impact on the States in 50 years that it has today.