A potentially ground-breaking voting rights case will soon be decided in federal district court in Winston-Salem, with important implications for the state’s 1.2 million young voters ages 18-25.
A trio of nonpartisan political organizations — Democracy North Carolina, North Carolina Black Alliance, and the League of Women Voters of North Carolina — is suing to overturn a portion of Senate Bill 747, which they claim unconstitutionally suppresses votes by young people.
The suit, originally filed in the Middle District of North Carolina in October of 2023, went to trial on Oct. 20 after Judge Thomas Schroeder denied lawmakers’ requests to dismiss the lawsuit. Oral arguments finished on Friday, and lawyers for both sides must now submit post-trial filings that sum up the facts proven at trial and the legal conclusions that follow before the judge issues a decision.
Senate Bill 747, which became law in 2023 after a Republican supermajority overrode Governor Roy Cooper’s veto, made a variety of changes to the state’s election law. While supporters like the North Carolina GOP argued the changes were “common sense reforms,” critics like Governor Roy Cooper called the legislation part of “an all-out assault on the right to vote.”
The lawsuit focuses on a single section of the law known as the “undeliverable mail” provision. Prior to 2023, if a voter used same-day registration to cast a ballot, county boards of election would attempt to verify their listed address two times via mailed letters. However, SB747 changed the law: if a mailed letter bounces as undeliverable the first time, the voter’s registration is canceled and their ballot thrown out.
Young voters are particularly impacted by this provision. Voters under the age of 26 overwhelmingly rely on same-day registration. Although they make up 12-14% of the voting population, they comprise 30-40% of same-day registrants, according to a pre-trial brief filed by the plaintiffs. They also rely heavily on a second mailer for verification. Some 45% of young voters were verified only by the second mailer, which then allowed their ballot to be counted.
“Folks on college campuses have complicated addressing standards, and different residential addresses than their mailing addresses,” said Adrianne Spoto, a Southern Coalition for Social Justice lawyer and counsel for the plaintiffs. “They also change residences more times. This makes the removal of the second mailer more problematic for them.”
State Sen. Warren Daniel, one of the original co-sponsors of SB747, declined to comment because the case is in active litigation.
The case is important beyond its direct implications for North Carolina’s voting laws. The plaintiffs are challenging the N.C. election law using the 26th Amendment, rather than the Voting Rights Act of 1965, 15th Amendment or 14th Amendment, which are more common ways of challenging electoral legislation. The 26th Amendment lowered the voting age from 21 to 18.
“This is going to be a landmark case on the 26th Amendment,” said Gunther Peck, a professor of history at Duke University and co-lead of the Student Voting Rights Lab.
Jennifer Rubin, president of League of Women Voters of North Carolina, argues this case is important to maintaining younger voters’ faith in the electoral system.
“Between the new laws governing voting and the currently ongoing attempt to further gerrymander our state, we want to counteract these negative actions with more positive messages about voting,” Rubin said. “The last thing we want for people is to read about the environment in North Carolina and become discouraged or stay home.”
Spoto is unsure when the judge will issue a final decision in this case, but she is hopeful for the outcome.
“The best case scenario is the judge enjoining this provision of SB747 and sending us back to the old system where voters’ votes aren’t in jeopardy for something that is out of their control,” Spoto said. “People’s votes should be protected, and their votes shouldn’t be left up to chance.”
Pictured above: Voters fill out ballots during early voting for the 2024 election. Photo by Kulsoom Rizavi — The 9th Street Journal
