The United States Supreme Court has allowed President Donald Trump’s administration to use a controversial voter verification system ahead of the November midterm elections.
In an emergency order issued on Friday, the court permitted the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to use the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) programme to help verify the eligibility of voters listed on state voter rolls.
Voting rights organisations have raised concerns that the system could incorrectly identify eligible US citizens as non-citizens, potentially resulting in their removal from voter registration lists.
Critics have also questioned the accuracy and currency of citizenship information contained in the database. An election official in Travis County, Texas, reportedly found that as many as 25 percent of people identified by the system as non-citizens were actually US citizens.
Election administration in the United States is largely handled by individual states, and states are not required to use the SAVE system. However, several Republican-led states have voluntarily chosen to use the database.
It remains unclear how much impact Friday’s ruling will have on the November 3 midterm elections, in which voters will elect members of Congress and determine which party controls the House of Representatives and Senate.
Federal law generally restricts states from systematically removing voters from registration rolls within 90 days of an election. The Supreme Court’s latest order is temporary and does not represent a final ruling on the legality of the administration’s use of the system.
The court’s three liberal justices dissented, arguing that the majority had failed to adequately consider the potential harm to eligible voters caused by the modified SAVE system.
The Citizens for Ethics watchdog group also criticised the decision, saying it could expose millions of Americans to what it described as an unreliable voter-purge system.
Trump has made election administration a major focus ahead of the midterms. He has repeatedly alleged widespread election fraud and has continued to claim, without evidence, that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him.
However, documented cases of election fraud in the United States, including voting by non-citizens, have been found to be rare.
The Supreme Court’s latest decision comes shortly after it rejected a Trump administration effort to restrict certain mail-ballot procedures ahead of the midterm elections.
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