An Oklahoma County [official website] judge upheld a controversial voter identification law [text, PDF] this week, allowing the law to be in place Thursday while early voting commenced [AP report] for a primary run-off. The Oklahoma law requires citizens to provide valid photo ID before voting. A brief [text, PDF] filed by the plaintiff in the suit alleged that the photo ID requirement would exclude more than half a million citizens from voting and would disproportionately impact vulnerable classes like minorities, the impoverished and the elderly. The law does allow for the use of provisional ballots and the acceptance of voter registration cards. Primarily because of these two attributes the defendants in the case argued [text, PDF] that the measure was “reasonable and not destructive to some constitutional right,” and that the plaintiff could not meet her burden to prove otherwise. This lawsuit began in 2012 in a suit claiming the photo identification requirement infringed upon the right to vote and came before the District Court for Oklahoma County in 2016. Opposition to the law have compared the requirement to a poll tax, while supporters of the law claim it will reduce voting fraud.

Voting rights have been the subject of numerous legal challenges across the US, particularly in years with a presidential election. Earlier this month a federal court denied a motion by North Carolina officials to stay an earlier order striking down the state’s voter ID law [JURIST report]. Earlier that week a federal judge barred North Dakota [JURIST report] from enforcing its voter ID law. Last month voter restrictions were overturned not only in North Carolina, but in Kansas and Wisconsin [JURIST reports]. In June a federal judge ruled that Ohio’s elimination of the state’s early in-person voting [JURIST report] was unconstitutional and in violation of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. In May a federal judge ruled that Virginia’s voter ID law, which requires that voters have a valid form of ID either before voting or within three days after voting, is constitutional [JURIST report]. In February the Maryland Senate overrode a veto by Governor Larry Hogan to pass a bill that will allow felons to vote [JURIST report] before they complete parole or probation.