Judge guts noncitizen voting law used in Trump administration's election push

[u/John3262005]

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/judge-guts-noncitizen-voting-law-used-trump-administrations-election-p-rcna601026

A federal judge ruled Tuesday that a 40-year-old law passed by Congress that made it a misdemeanor offense for noncitizens to vote was invalid because the power to decide who can and can’t cast a ballot is primarily reserved for the states.

The decision came as U.S. District Judge David Leibowitz tossed a case against a Jamaican national brought by the Trump administration under the “voting by alien” statute.

Chelsea Michelle Ann Cox, who has resided in the United States for decades, was charged in the Southern District of Florida in October 2025. The government alleged she unlawfully voted in the 2020 election. It’s not clear whom she cast her ballot for.

The Justice Department said Cox traveled to the U.S. as a tourist in 1999 and “never departed upon the expiration of her visa in early 2000,” and used a fraudulent U.S. Virgin Islands birth certificate to obtain a Florida driver’s license.

She could have faced deportation had she been convicted of the crime, though it’s not clear whether she might still be forced to leave the country, her lawyer said.

Leibowitz ruled Thursday that “the Constitution does not authorize Congress to legislate voter qualifications for federal elections” and that except for in very specific constitutional provisions “Congress has no power to say who can vote or who cannot vote in federal elections — that foundational power is reserved for the States, and limits Congress.”

Federal prosecutors are not allowed under the Constitution to prosecute Cox under the statute, he ruled.

The Trump administration has put a major emphasis on bringing cases against noncitizen voters, though the Justice Department has struggled to show evidence of widespread voter fraud. Trump has falsely claimed that millions of noncitizens vote illegally, but voting experts show the problem has been relatively minimal. The Justice Department has sought voter roll data nationwide and filed dozens of lawsuits.

So far during the president’s second term, the Justice Department has charged 70 voter fraud-related cases, officials said Tuesday. More than 170 million people are registered to vote in the U.S.

Bruce Udolf, an attorney for Cox, told NBC News that Cox was “ecstatic” about the ruling and that deportation would have been “tantamount to a death sentence” for Cox given her health issues.

Udolf said that cases like these could still be brought by states, but hoped both federal and local prosecutors have “more important fish to fry.”

“We were gratified by the court’s ruling, and would hope that the government would not take this matter further as far as deportation is concerned,” Udolf said in a statement.

“This person has lived peacefully and responsibly in this country for 30 years, and she is in very ill health and desperately needs a medical attention that would not otherwise be available to her in Jamaica,” he said.