The US Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to hear a case over voting rights that is part of a long-running dispute between Republicans and Democrats.
The court said it would consider an appeal from the Republican-controlled state of Ohio after a lower court blocked a policy to purge voter-registration lists of people who do not vote regularly, saying it violated federal law.
The state’s officials argue that canceling the registration of voters who had appeared inactive for six years helped keep voting rolls current and accurate.
But critics say that purging voter lists was aimed at removing minorities, poor voters and others who tend to support the Democratic Party.
An appellate court ruled in September last year that the Ohio authorities had violated the National Voter Registration Act, passed by Congress in 1993 to make it easier to register to vote.
The Supreme Court’s decision to hear the case represents a victory for the Ohio authorities.
“The right to vote is not a use-it-or-lose-it right,” said Demos, a liberal think-tank.
Ohio removed hundreds of thousands of people from voter-registration lists in 2015, civil rights groups say.
The majority of those purged voted Democratic, including a high proportion of African Americans and Hispanics, they say.
“As we have seen time and time again, homeless voters and other marginalized voters have to fight to make their voices heard in the electoral process,” said Brian Davis of the Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless (NEOCH).
Rules governing voting rights are the source of many legal disputes in the United States.
Republicans say new restrictions are needed to crack down on voter fraud. Most Democrats say that problem is negligible and really used to justify suppressing the Democratic vote.
Last week, the Supreme Court found Republican lawmakers in North Carolina guilty of illegally using race to draw up congressional districts that would dilute the strength of African-American voters.
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