Three election integrity organizations filed an amicus brief urging the Supreme Court to reverse a 9th Circuit ruling that struck down Arizona laws requiring proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote, and allowing the state to remove noncitizens from voter rolls before an election. The groups warned that letting the lower court’s decision stand would make it functionally impossible for any state to keep illegal immigrants off its voter rolls.
The case, RNC v. Mi Familia Vote, has been building for years. Arizona passed laws requiring documentary proof of citizenship for voter registration and permitting the removal of noncitizen registrations within 90 days of a federal election. The 9th Circuit struck both provisions down, calling them violations of the National Voter Registration Act and characterizing them as “voter suppression.”
Now the Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case, with oral arguments set for December. The amicus brief, filed Thursday by the Center for Election Confidence, Restoring Integrity and Trust in Elections (RITE), and the Honest Elections Project, lays out a constitutional argument that goes well beyond Arizona, and raises a question the justices will have to answer: Can states verify that voters are actually citizens?
The three organizations argue that the Constitution gives states the authority to set voter qualifications, and that this authority is hollow if states cannot require documentation to verify citizenship. As Fox News Digital reported, the brief states that “the power to establish voting requirements is of little value without the power to enforce those requirements” and warns it “would raise serious constitutional doubts if a federal statute precluded a State from obtaining the information necessary to enforce its voter qualifications.”
The 9th Circuit concluded that a voter’s own attestation of citizenship on a registration form is sufficient proof of eligibility. The amicus brief calls that reading of the NVRA wrong, arguing the appeals court misread what information is “necessary” for state election officials to assess a voter’s eligibility.
The brief also takes aim at the 9th Circuit’s interpretation of the NVRA’s 90-day pre-election window. Federal law generally requires states to complete systematic voter-roll cleanup programs at least 90 days before a federal election. The law carves out exceptions during that window for removals based on a voter’s request, death, criminal conviction, or mental incapacity.
The 9th Circuit read that list of exceptions as exhaustive, meaning if a reason for removal isn’t on the list, the state cannot act during the 90-day period. Since noncitizenship isn’t listed, the court concluded Arizona could not remove noncitizens from the rolls in the weeks before an election.
The amicus brief argues this interpretation leads to a result so sweeping it undermines itself. If the 9th Circuit is correct, the brief warns, “States could never remove improperly registered individuals who fall within these categories, no matter when the removal happens or whether it is after a systematic inquiry.” The brief adds bluntly: “Not just that, but these States could never remove these noncitizens who were never eligible to vote.”
The organizations frame the 90-day restriction as a safeguard for eligible voters who might be erroneously purged at the last minute, not a shield for people who were never lawfully registered in the first place. A noncitizen who registers to vote, the brief argues, is not an eligible voter who deserves pre-election protection. That person was never eligible at all.
The brief also warns that once an unlawful ballot is cast and counted, it cannot be undone. That is the practical stakes of the timing question: if a state discovers a noncitizen on its rolls 80 days before an election and cannot act, that person may vote, and no remedy exists after the fact.
The Supreme Court has already engaged with parts of this dispute. In a fractured 2024 ruling, the justices allowed Arizona to require proof of citizenship for state-form voter registration but declined to reinstate requirements for presidential and mail-in voting. Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Kavanaugh served as swing votes in that earlier decision. Justices Thomas, Alito, and Gorsuch voted to uphold all three provisions of Arizona’s 2022 election integrity law.
Arizona is not fighting alone. Twenty-four state attorneys general have filed their own brief supporting the state’s position. That coalition brief argued that “voting by noncitizens, both legal and illegal, is real” and that “even small voting blocs can have outsized effects on electoral outcomes.” Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton stated that “states have a constitutional right and responsibility to ensure that only legal votes from American citizens are counted.”
The RNC’s own petition to the Court laid out the pattern of litigation Arizona has faced. As the Washington Examiner reported, the RNC told the justices that “for years, Arizona has taken common-sense steps to enforce its citizenship qualification and secure its elections. Each time, it has had to defend those steps from federal lawsuits.”
That pattern extends beyond Arizona. A Clinton-appointed judge recently blocked Ohio’s voter citizenship proof requirement, and the U.S. House passed the SAVE Act to prevent noncitizen voter registration in federal elections, only to see it stall in the Senate.
The amicus brief points to registration errors in New Jersey, Illinois, and Oregon as evidence that the problem is not theoretical. New Jersey’s Democratic governor acknowledged that thousands of noncitizens were discovered on the state’s voter rolls and purged. The state reportedly removed 6,600 people from its rolls who were not eligible to cast a ballot in the 2024 election.
These examples underscore the brief’s central claim: if states lack the tools to verify citizenship and clean their rolls, noncitizen registrations will persist, and some of those registrants will vote. The brief characterizes the 9th Circuit’s labeling of Arizona’s laws as “voter suppression” as itself an “absurd” framing, given that the laws target only people who are legally barred from voting.
The Supreme Court has been increasingly active on election-law questions. The justices recently issued a 6-3 ruling on mail-in ballot rules, and lower courts continue to wrestle with the boundaries of federal versus state authority over elections.
Justin Riemer, president and CEO of RITE, told Fox News Digital:
“Citizenship is a qualification for voting. If states are going to enforce that requirement, they have to be able to verify it. And when officials find noncitizens on the voter rolls, they should be able to act before an election, not after. We are confident the Supreme Court will agree and reverse the Ninth Circuit’s misguided ruling.”
Lisa Dixon, executive director of the Center for Election Confidence, was equally direct:
“American elections are for American citizens only. Period. We should all support Arizona ensuring noncitizens can’t register to vote and removing any non-citizens who end up on the voter lists.”
Jason Snead, executive director of the Honest Elections Project, framed the case as part of a broader pattern of legal activism:
“Once again, far-left activists are using the courts to twist federal law into a straitjacket that prevents states from securing their elections. The Honest Elections Project urges the Supreme Court to side with Arizona and preserve the tools states need to ensure that elections are decided only by American citizens.”
Federal courts have become the primary arena for these fights. An Obama-appointed judge recently blocked a federal mail-ballot rule, and election experts have warned that courts are running out the clock on election security measures, leaving states unable to implement reforms before voters go to the polls.
When the justices hear oral arguments in RNC v. Mi Familia Vote, they will confront a question that goes far beyond one state’s registration forms. The case will determine whether the NVRA, a law designed to make voter registration easier, can also be read to prevent states from confirming that registrants are citizens at all.
The 9th Circuit’s answer was yes. The amicus brief argues that answer guts the constitutional authority of every state to enforce its own voter qualifications. If a state cannot require proof of citizenship and cannot remove noncitizens from its rolls before an election, the citizenship requirement exists only on paper.
Several major questions remain unanswered. The current enforcement status of Arizona’s laws, whether they are enjoined pending the Supreme Court’s ruling, is unclear. No opposing statements from Mi Familia Vote or other groups supporting the 9th Circuit’s position appear in the available record. And the precise scope of noncitizen registrations across states remains a matter of dispute, though the New Jersey, Illinois, and Oregon examples cited in the brief suggest the problem is not confined to a single jurisdiction.
The Supreme Court has also sided with states on other election-administration questions, including the counting of mail-in ballots received after Election Day, a signal that the current Court takes state authority over elections seriously.
A law that says only citizens can vote means nothing if no one is allowed to check.
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