President Donald Trump’s U.S. Department of Justice on Tuesday asked a Wyoming federal court to let it help defend the state’s new voter citizenship law by filing a brief.
The Equality State Policy Center, which is a coalition of other nonprofit groups, sued Secretary of State Chuck Gray on May 9 to stop the new law which, as of Tuesday, requires proof of U.S. citizenship and 30 days’ Wyoming residency to register to vote in the state.
The group said the law will heap unnecessary burdens on challenged groups like women, products of the foster-care system, transgender people, some Hispanic people and others.
The United States government, through the office of Acting U.S. Attorney for Wyoming Stephanie Sprecher, filed a motion asking permission to file an amicus brief in the case in support of Gray.
“This case presents important questions regarding enforcement of the Fourteenth Amendment’s voting rights protections, in which the United States has a substantial interest,” says the filing.
This follows a Thursday motion by the Republican National Committee, which wants to intervene as a party in the case to defend the law.
The federal government’s proposed brief points to the U.S. Constitution’s grant of state authority to regulate the “times, places and manner of holding elections,” and the federal National Voter Registration Act of 1993, which requires attestation of citizenship when registering for a driver’s license.
President Donald Trump on March 25 also signed an executive order to safeguard elections from fraud, the proposed brief says.
Governments are not allowed to burden the voting right to an unconstitutional level.
“Almost every voting rule will impose some burden,” the proposed brief says. “But slight inconveniences, including the processes necessary to acquire photo identification to register or vote, do not delegitimize the State’s interest in preventing fraud or seriously hinder the ability to vote.”
Assistant U.S. Attorney C. Levi Martin and U.S. DOJ Civil Rights Division attorney Timothy F. Mellett signed the proposed brief.
Gray celebrated the filing in a Tuesday statement, extending his thanks to Trump and pointing to Trump’s own agenda to prevent voter fraud.
"Proof of citizenship for registering to vote is a common sense, conservative measure pivotal to election integrity, and has been a key part of President Trump’s Executive Order to Preserve and Protect the Integrity of American Elections," Gray said in a Tuesday statement. "We have been diligently at work to implement President Trump’s election integrity priorities here in Wyoming with key, conservative reforms, like requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote.
“I am extremely grateful for President Trump’s and the DOJ’s leadership and prioritization of these important election integrity measures."
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
