GOPs Record-Breaking Voting Lawsuits: Democracy Docket Report

The cover image of this article is from usatoday.com.

Republican Party Increases Fight Over Voting Access By Filing Record-Number Of Anti-Voting Suits

The Republican party has shifted the fight over voting access and election administration to courtrooms, filing a record number of anti-voting lawsuits in 2020. According to a new report by Democracy Docket, a progressive media platform that tracks voting litigation, the Republican groups filed 23 democracy-related lawsuits. These included efforts to challenge election results, attack mail-in voting, and attempt to undermine the election administration.

On the other hand, their Democratic counterparts filed only six lawsuits in 2020 all of which tried to protect or expand the right to vote. This is a marked increase from the 20 suits filed by the Republican party in 2020, the year of the presidential election when Donald Trump’s loss was contested in courts for months.

The report said, “Evidently, the GOP establishment is becoming more litigious than ever and is turning to courts to achieve its anti-voting and anti-democracy ends.”

Overall, the report identified a total count of 175 voting lawsuits filed in 2020, an increase from 150 suits in 2020. Out of these 175, 93 lawsuits were characterized as anti-voting and the Republican party (defined as the Republican National Committee, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the National Republican Congressional Committee, or state or county Republican parties) took responsibility for almost 25%. However, Republican candidates who weren’t backed by their party also filed 25 lawsuits, many of which were election-denial cases. One such example was Mark Finchem in Arizona who contested the state secretary’s race he lost in November. But a judge later threw out Finchem’s lawsuit in December due to his failure to provide evidence of election misconduct.

Many of these anti-voting suits were based on what Democracy Docket termed as ‘fringe’ theories, which often promoted a ‘big lie’ or relied on conspiracy theories to challenge election results or limit voting opportunities. Not only this, a number of them continued to challenge the 2020 election results even two years later, including a case in Michigan filed in September by a group of Republicans that sought to decertify the election 648 days after it was officially certified.

The most number of new suits were filed in three battleground states with prominent election deniers on the ballot such as Arizona, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. The report also analyzed the consequential orders in each of the voting-related lawsuits in 2020 and found out that a majority of them were wins for voting rights. Out of 175 consequential orders, 116 were victories for voters, 35 were losses for voters and 27 were neutral decisions.

Unfortunately, the litigation is unlikely to slow down in the next two years, as the Republican party appealed nearly a third of the final orders that benefited voters last year. Additionally, the upcoming 2024 presidential election will no doubt bring about a new wave of lawsuits.