Natural State News

Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge has asked Pulaski County Judge Wendell Griffen to allow four election reform laws that he shot down in a ruling earlier this week to remain in effect until the Supreme Court rules on the appeal. 

As of this writing, the judge has yet to indicate whether he will honor Rutledge's request.

Earlier, Rutledge promised to appeal Griffen’s ruling, saying in a statement emailed to Natural State News “as the attorney general, I will fight to ensure that Arkansans' fundamental right to vote is protected.”

In the case, the judge ruled the laws unconstitutional and granted the plaintiffs, the League of Women Voters of Arkansas and Arkansas United, their request for a permanent injunction. Griffen said that the laws place an undue burden on voters, and he found “that the defendant's stated concerns about election integrity and insecurity are based entirely on conjecture and speculation. Conjecture and speculation, however plausible, cannot be permitted to supply the place of proof.”

Many Republican lawmakers have followed former President Donald Trump's lead on this matter after he argued, without proof, that he lost the 2020 presidential election due to massive voter fraud. Trump carried Arkansas in 2020 with more than 62% of the statewide vote.

Among other changes to the state’s election laws that were approved by the Arkansas Legislature last spring. The bills require signatures on absentee ballots to be compared to the signatures on voters’ original registration certificates. The laws also banned the distribution of unsolicited absentee ballots, and prohibit being within 100 feet of an entrance to a polling site unless entering, or leaving, the building for a “lawful” reason.

The bills are similar to laws approved in other states in response to what Republicans argue are loose voting procedures ushered in during the COVID-19 pandemic, especially the heavy reliance on mail ballots and drop boxes. Allegations of voter suppression have been made regarding those laws as well. The U.S. Department of Justice has sued Georgia over its laws.

But voter integrity advocates point to polls show that voters across demographic lines support stricter voter ID laws and other security measures. And they cite that election laws in many blue states are some of the most restrictive in the nation, Atlantic staff writer Russell Burman reports.