Supreme Court allows Trump administration to use disputed database for voter citizenship checks
The US Supreme Court has lifted restrictions on the Trump administration's use of the SAVE database to verify voters' citizenship status, over the dissent of its three liberal justices. Critics warn the system risks wrongly stripping eligible citizens of their voting rights.
The US Supreme Court ruled on Friday, in a decision split along its conservative majority, that the Trump administration may continue using the disputed federal SAVE database to check voters' citizenship status. The court's three liberal justices dissented.
The database, known as Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, was originally created in 1986 to help verify the citizenship or immigration status of people applying for public benefits. Last year the Trump administration expanded its capabilities to allow bulk searches using sensitive Social Security data. Use of the system by individual states is voluntary, and 27 states currently rely on it to check voter rolls.
In June, US District Judge Sparkle L Soonnan, a Biden appointee, ruled the revamped system illegal, finding that the federal government had knowingly violated the privacy rights of American citizens in a way that threatened their right to vote. A federal appeals court let that ruling stand, but the Supreme Court overturned it on Friday.
The justices found that a 1996 law requires the Department of Homeland Security to respond to states seeking citizenship and immigration data from federal records. At the same time, the court noted that the National Voter Registration Act bars sweeping purges of voter rolls close to an election, limiting the practical effect of the ruling ahead of the midterms.
Dissenting justice Ketanji Brown Jackson warned the system could mistakenly disenfranchise eligible voters, arguing the harm to lawful voters outweighs any harm to the government from being blocked. Critics point to Travis County, Texas, where at least 10% of nearly 100 voters flagged as non-citizens turned out to be US citizens. Since Texas began using SAVE to screen its rolls last year, only three people have been charged with illegal voting in the state. The Trump administration maintains the system is lawful and necessary to prevent non-citizens from voting.
