Courts vacates the district court’s judgment that SB 14 was passed with a racially discriminatory purpose and remands for further consideration of Plaintiffs’ discriminatory purpose claims, using the proper legal standards and evidence. Court vacates the district court’s holding that SB 14 is a poll tax under the Fourteenth and Twenty-Fourth Amendments and renders judgment for the State on this issue. Court does not address whether SB 14 unconstitutionally burdens the right to vote under the First and Fourteenth Amendments; therefore, Court vacates the district court’s judgment on that issue and dismisses those claims. Court affirms the district court’s finding that SB 14 violates Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act through its discriminatory effects and remands for consideration of the appropriate remedy. Finally, on remand, the district court should: (1) give further consideration to its discriminatory purpose findings as specified herein; and (2) if the district court does not find that SB 14 was imposed with a discriminatory purpose, consider what remedy it should grant due to SB 14’s discriminatory problematic.”). Court does not further opine on this issue at this time, leaving it to the district court in the first instance on remand. Case: 14-41127 Document: 00513142615 Page: 50 Date Filed: 08/05/2015 No. 14-41127 49 effect in violation of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, taking account of any impact of SB 983 and this opinion. It is left to the district court in the first instance to decide whether any additional evidence may be proffered on the matters remanded.

Both the City of Falls Church and the Attorney General filed a Joint Motion for Entry of Consent Judgment and Decree based on the agreed findings outlined in the document.

Settlement agreement document.

The applications to vacate the stay entered by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on October 14, 2014, presented to Justice Scalia and by him referred to the Court are denied. The motion for leave to file the response to the applications under seal with redacted copies for the public record is granted. 

By this order, the district court enjoined the implementation of Texas Senate Bill 14 (“SB 14”) of the 2011 Regular Session, which requires that voters present certain photographic identification at the polls. The district court also ordered that the State of Texas (“State”) instead implement the laws that were in force before SB 14’s enactment in May of 2011. Based primarily on the extremely fast-approaching election date, we STAY the district court’s judgment pending appeal.

This expedited appeal, which included briefing and oral argument, involves Texas’s recently enacted Voter ID law, which True the Vote supported and sponsored as a public-interest group. Various plaintiffs’ groups and the United States have sued the state, claiming the law violates the Voting Rights Act and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments. Several other groups were permitted to intervene on behalf of the plaintiffs. True the Vote timely moved to intervene as of right to defend the statute. The United States opposed the motion, and the district judge, without issuing an independent opinion but relying almost exclusively on a Florida court order in a different case, denied intervention. Because True the Vote has not shown that the State of Texas cannot adequately represent its interests in this litigation, we affirm the order denying intervention as of right. 

Pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 52(a), after hearing and carefully considering all the evidence, the Court issues this Opinion as its findings of fact and conclusions of law. The Court holds that SB 14 creates an unconstitutional burden on the right to vote, has an impermissible discriminatory effect against Hispanics and African-Americans, and was imposed with an unconstitutional discriminatory purpose. The Court further holds that SB 14 constitutes an unconstitutional poll tax. 

The U.S. Supreme Court today unanimously held in Evenwel v. Abbott that all people count for the purpose of drawing voting districts, not just eligible voters.

In Wolfson v. Concannon, the en banc U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit upheld Arizona rules involving campaigns for judicial office. Prior to the en banc proceedings, a three-judge Ninth Circuit panel had invalidated the challenged rules—which include provisions restricting judicial candidates from personally soliciting political contributions or endorsing, speaking in favor of or campaigning for non-judicial candidates—as they applied to non-incumbent judicial candidates. Invoking the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in Williams-Yulee v. Florida Bar, the en banc court held that Arizona’s rules are narrowly tailored to its compelling interest in upholding public confidence in the judiciary.

In Van Hollen v. FEC, the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit once again upheld an FEC rule that severely limits federal disclosure requirements connected to “electioneering communications.” The appellate panel overturned a district court decision holding the rule “arbitrary, capricious, and contrary to law” for improperly narrowing the scope of the McCain-Feingold law’s disclosure requirements and allowing nonprofit 501(c)(4) advocacy groups, 501(c)(6) business associations, and others to spend millions on “electioneering communications” without disclosing their donors.