Republicans lead charge to ban noncitizens from voting in local elections

Louisiana voters recently approved a constitutional amendment barring anyone who is not a US citizen from participating in elections, becoming the eighth state to push back against the growing number of progressive cities deciding to allow noncitizens to vote in local elections.

While noncitizens are prohibited from voting in federal elections and no states allow noncitizens to vote for statewide office, ambiguous language in constitutions has allowed localities to pass statutes legalizing noncitizen voting in local or school board elections. A short but expanding list of cities include two cities in Vermont, almost a dozen in Maryland, and San Francisco.

The potential for major cities like DC and New York to expand their electorates prompted backlash from Republican lawmakers.

Before 2020, just Arizona and North Dakota specifically prohibited noncitizens from voting in local and state elections, but voters in Alabama, Colorado and Florida all approved constitutional amendments in 2020 and Ohio approved one in November.

Fulvia Vargas-De Leon, senior counsel at LatinoJustice PRLDEF, a New York-based immigrant rights group, said the movement for ballot amendments is just one way that some lawmakers are trying to restrict voting rights.

The United States allowed noncitizens to vote for much of its early history. From the founding of the country through 1926, noncitizens could vote in local, state and federal elections. But anti-immigrant sentiment led to lawmakers in most states to push for an end to the practice.

In 1996, Congress passed a law prohibiting noncitizens from voting in federal elections, making illegal voting punishable by fines, imprisonment and deportation.

But on the local level, the subject has re-emerged as a topic for debate in recent decades, as the populations of permanent noncitizen immigrants has grown in many cities.

Advocates for noncitizen voting argue that documented immigrants pay taxes and contribute to their local communities and should have their voices heard when it comes to local policy.

Though noncitizen voting still has not been signed into law in DC, Republicans in Congress have already introduced legislation to block it. One bill, introduced by the Texas senator Ted Cruz last month, would bar DC from using federal funds to facilitate noncitizen voting.