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The Supreme Court’s conservative majority on Wednesday allowed Virginia to resume its removal of voter registrations that the state says is aimed at stopping people who are not U.S. citizens from voting.
The high court, over the dissents of the three liberal justices, granted an emergency appeal from Virginia’s Republican administration led by Gov. Glenn Youngkin. The court provided no rationale for its action, which is typical in emergency appeals.
The justices acted on Virginia’s appeal after a federal judge found that the state illegally removed more than 1,600 voter registrations in the past two months. A federal appeals court had previously allowed the judge’s order to remain in effect.
Such voting is rare in American elections, but the specter of immigrants voting illegally has been a main part of the political messaging this year from former President Donald Trump and other Republicans.
Youngkin joined WTOP’s Shawn Anderson and Anne Kramer on Wednesday to talk about the Supreme Court’s ruling.
The following transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.
Glenn Youngkin: This is a victory for common sense and for the Constitution. And I just want to reiterate the practice that Virginia has engaged in is one that has been in place for 18 years, since 2006 and it’s a practice that starts with somebody walking into a DMV and identifying themselves as a noncitizen. And then if that person ends up on the voter rolls, either purposely or by accident, then the process starts where they are notified, they’re given two weeks in order to affirm that they are a citizen, and if they don’t respond in the self addressed envelope that they get, then they are remove from the voter rolls.
And ultimately, there’s a fail safe that can catch any issue, which is a person today in Virginia, can of course, walk up day of and register and vote. And so this process is one that we felt was one tried and true because it had been put in place for a long time. It had been preapproved by the Justice Department back in 2006 and in fact, it starts with people self identifying as noncitizens. And so I do think that everyone in Virginia should trust the elections. We have paper ballots, and we have counting machines that aren’t hooked up to the internet, and we have great ballot custody rules and we have clean voter rolls and everyone who is a citizen in the Commonwealth of Virginia should go vote.
And this is a great chance for people to make their voice heard. I encourage everyone, if you’re a citizen, go vote, and if you aren’t registered because you missed the registration deadline, you can still walk up to a registrar in Virginia and same-day register and cast a ballot.
Anne Kramer: How confident are you, though, that the evidence that you have of the people that you’ve purged already, the 1,600, are not here legally? Because there are some reports that people say they are citizens, they have been voting for decades, and maybe they just checked the wrong box by mistake, and they didn’t know it, but they’re now not able to vote.
Glenn Youngkin: I do take issue with the word purge. I mean this has been a consistent process for a long period of time, and it does begin with somebody who claims that they are a noncitizen. And I recognize that sometimes a person could check the wrong box, but by law, that’s where my process has to start, and this is the way that Virginia law works, and therefore I have to follow it.
But that’s also why we have the multiple safeguards in place, which first, the person is notified and given 14 days to simply affirm, ‘No, I am a citizen, and therefore I shouldn’t be taken off the voter rolls.’ And if they if they miss that deadline, then of course, they can always go same-day register and vote. And that is the ultimate fail safe. No citizen in Virginia, who is legally able to vote, will be precluded from voting. Just go vote. And that’s what I encourage everyone to do in this most important election.
Shawn Anderson: Gov. Youngkin, while we have you, former President Trump is scheduled to hold a rally in Salem, Virginia, this weekend. Now the Republicans, on behalf of President Trump, have not poured all that much money here into the Old Dominion.
A double-edged question here. No. 1, do you plan to join Donald Trump in Salem this weekend? And is there any internal polling that suggests Virginia is in play, given that the president, the former president, is going to be here just three days before the election?
Glenn Youngkin: Well, first of all, I do plan on joining him. And you know, this is his third rally that he’s held in Virginia. And I have to say that Vice President Harris has not come and done a rally in Virginia, to the best of my knowledge. And I think it reflects two things, one, that President Trump is coming to ask Virginians for their votes. And then second of all, that Virginia is surprisingly competitive. And I think there’s no pundit that, when we started this, would have believed that Virginia is as tight as it is.
Listen, Joe Biden won Virginia by 10 points back in 2020 and then I was able to win in 2021 and I do believe that Virginians are standing up and voting on the issues that they think are most important to them, and it consistently is the economy. They want a strong economy, not a weak one, and they’ve seen what the Biden-Harris administration unleashed with inflation. They want a secure border. It’s one of the top issues, and every state’s become a border state, and they want a president who will secure the border.
And finally, Virginians broadly have voiced strong opinions around a strong America. And the wars we’re seeing around the world, in Ukraine, in the Middle East, and of course, with China, once again threatening Taiwan, really are reflective of weak foreign policy from the Biden-Harris administration. And so I think this is the reason why Virginia is tighter than any pundit would have possibly have thought at this point, and why President Trump is coming back once again, once again, coming back and asking Virginians for their vote.
Anne Kramer: Governor, are you OK with the tone of former President Trump’s campaign and the words that he says on a stage — harken back to Sunday and what other people said on stage, the racist and bigoted comments that were made — and do you have any idea or any comfortability with that?
Glenn Youngkin: Well, let me just begin with the fact that I expect the rally on Saturday to really be very consistent with the political statements that I’ve just made around strength versus weakness. And I do think it is unfair for folks to consistently say that the tone of the Trump campaign is adversarial or argumentative, when literally what I’ve seen coming out of the Harris campaign, and particularly what Joe Biden said yesterday, is divisive and is accusatorial and is condemning.
And you know, listen, I’m glad the election’s next Tuesday, and we’re going to have this finalized because I think America needs to come together. But I will tell you, I have seen more divisive language coming out of the Harris-Biden camp, than I would have possibly have imagined from someone who started this campaign with a campaign of joy and vibes, and then figured out that it wasn’t working for her, and now he has become very, very negative and divisive.
And so here we go. We’re going into the last few days of this campaign. Virginians can vote all the way through Saturday early and then finally, on Tuesday the 5th. And again, I encourage everyone — get out and vote and make your voice heard. And this is our chance to exercise what I think is the most coveted and valued aspect of being an American, and that is electing our leaders.
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