President Donald Trump cannot alter federal voter registration forms to require proof of citizenship, a judge ruled Friday.
Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, ruled that only Congress and the states have the power to regulate federal elections. Kollar-Kotelly deemed unconstitutional Trump’s March executive order requiring documentary proof of citizenship on the national mail voter registration form.
“The first question presented in these consolidated cases is whether the President, acting unilaterally, may direct changes to federal election procedures. Because our Constitution assigns responsibility for election regulation to the States and to Congress, this Court holds that the President lacks the authority to direct such changes,” Kollar-Kotelly wrote.
The judge is an appointee of former President Bill Clinton. Her ruling came as a judgment in the case brought by several Democratic groups against Trump’s executive order titled “Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections.”
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson signaled that the current administration will appeal the ruling to a higher court.
“President Trump has exercised his lawful authority to ensure only American citizens are casting ballots in American elections. This is so commonsense that only the Democrat Party would file a lawsuit against it. We expect to be vindicated by a higher court,” Jackson said in a statement to the Washington Examiner.
Trump pitched the March executive order as a measure to ensure election integrity. The White House released a fact sheet saying that the order “strengthens voter citizenship verification and bans foreign nationals from interfering in U.S. elections.”
The ruling “permanently” enjoins the Trump administration from implementing Section 2(a) of the executive order, which requires the Election Assistance Commission to require national mail voter registration forms to include “documentary proof of United States citizenship.”
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The League of United Latin American Citizens, a plaintiff in the lawsuit, praised the judge’s ruling in a statement on Friday.
“From the beginning, LULAC has been at the vanguard of defending the rights of children born in this country,” Roman Palomares, LULAC national president, said in a statement. “Nearly a century of leadership has taught us that when civil rights are threatened, we must act boldly and without hesitation.”