The GOP is looking to annihilate a voting law proliferating through the country that enables citizens to vote in states where they have never dwelled.
According to a story by the Daily Signal, the Nebraska Supreme Court could settle the constitutionality of a state law that permits U.S. citizens living abroad who have not lived in the state—or even lived in the United States—to vote in Nebraska elections. Nebraska is one of three dozen states that sanction some form of this law.
“The RNC is taking this fight all the way to the Nebraska Supreme Court because Nebraska elections should be decided by Nebraska voters, period,” Ally Triolo, RNC election integrity communications director, told the Daily Signal. “This loophole allows certain people who have never lived in the state to vote, weakening the safeguards that protect election integrity. We’re fighting to close it, protect the ballot box, and uphold the law.”
The Republican National Committee has contested what it calls “Never Resident” voting laws in seven states, joining local plaintiffs. A state high court ruling could put the matter on a pathway to the U.S. Supreme Court and establish a national pattern.
Jack Riggins and Pamela Dingman, two Nebraska voters who filed the complaint were joined in the lawsuit by the RNC, contending their votes are being attenuated.
The RNC appealed a ruling by Lancaster County District Judge Ryan Post, who upheld the state’s 2005 law.
“A statute is presumed to be constitutional, and all reasonable doubts are resolved in favor of its constitutionality,” Post wrote in his Aug. 12 opinion. Article VI, Section 1, of the Nebraska Constitution specifies that those eligible to vote in the state must be U.S. citizens who are at least 18 and “have resided within the state and the county and voting precinct” in which they are casting a vote.
The state law says, “A person who is the age of an elector and a citizen of the United States residing outside the United States, who has never resided in the United States, who has not registered to vote in any other state of the United States, and who has a parent registered to vote within this state shall be eligible to register to vote and vote in one county in which either one of his or her parents is a registered voter.”
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