No more voter registration at KY naturalization ceremonies? ‘Another attack.’ | Opinion
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- USCIS memo restricts voter registration at ceremonies to government officials
- League of Women Voters criticizes policy as barrier for new citizens' rights
- Legal challenges to Trump's election order remain pending in federal courts
Several Kentucky nonprofits that help new citizens register to vote are alarmed by a new federal policy memo that bans them from offering such services at naturalization ceremonies.
According to the Aug. 29 memo from the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, only state and local election officials can register voters at naturalization services, in line with an executive order from President Donald Trump on “election integrity.”
Because elections are governed by state governments, the executive order was immediately challenged in court, leading federal judges to block several key parts. Those challenges are still being litigated.
Nonetheless, the memo was published, provoking reactions from groups like the nonpartisan League of Women Voters, which has registered new citizens at naturalization centers for decades. The League also filed suit against Trump’s executive order earlier this year.
“The league has been doing voter registration at naturalization ceremonies for decades — they are wonderful events and it’s a wonderful time for them to register so they’re prepared to exercise that right,” said Jenn Jackson, president of the League’s Kentucky chapter. “Unfortunately, the Secretary of State’s office is not always available to attend those ceremonies, so I worry new citizens will that opportunity to vote.”
The League’s national CEO, Celina Stewart, also criticized the move.
“The USCIS decision to bar nonpartisan organizations from providing voter registration services at naturalization ceremonies is an attempt to keep new citizens from accessing their full rights,” Stewart said in a statement. “By shutting out the League and other civic partners, USCIS is making it harder for new citizens to register to vote, which is yet another intimidation tactic and attack on the immigrant community. Our democracy is stronger with the voices of new citizens.”
Secretary of State Michael Adams said he or his employees attend all the naturalization services to which they are invited, and they always bring voter registration materials. He said the order applies to naturalization ceremonies held at USCIS facilities; it’s not clear if federal courthouses or other locations, where many are held, will also be affected. Federal court officials in Kentucky did not return calls for comment.
“Obviously, it’s not just the government registering voters,” Adams said. “You’ve got left-leaning groups, right-leaning groups, non-leaning groups — it’s a specific, IRS-recognized purpose.”
In April, University of Kentucky law professor Josh Douglas published a paper on the tradition of third-party voter registration. In it, he found three periods of expanded voter registration through third party organizations: the women’s suffrage movement, the Civil Rights Movement, and in the 1990s after the National Voter Registration Act.
“Interested parties and organizations have engaged in voter registration activities for almost as long as there have been registration lists,” he wrote.
In an interview, Douglas said the memo appears to “cut against that history.”
“There is nothing partisan about helping citizens register to vote,” Douglas said. “This is just another in a long line of attacks on free and fair elections.”
Here in Kentucky, Republicans have tried to paint the League of Women Voters as partisan because it published a report on the lack of transparency by the GOP’s legislative supermajority in making laws. For example, they frequently introduce, discuss and pass bills before the public has had a chance to see them.
But those are just facts. And just because they are unfavorable to the GOP does not mean they are partisan.
The New Americans Initiative is a nonpartisan nonprofit that helps people with the pathway to citizenship, and then voting. They partner with the League and other groups to increase voter registration, said the group’s executive director, Nima Kulkarni, who is also a legislator from Louisville.
“In my opinion, this is just another mechanism to limit access to voter registration resources for newly naturalized citizens,” Kulkarni said.
Now, Trump is trying to stack all the decks by limiting who can vote, by getting red states to redistrict mid-cycle to get more Congressional seats, and by limiting how voters get registered.
This may seem like a small thing, but it’s just one more chip out of the foundations of our democracy.
