Wisconsin voters don’t need a photo ID to cast a ballot on Nov. 4, thanks to an emergency ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court late Thursday.
In a terse statement, the court said that the law shouldn’t be implemented so close to an election, which is consistent with their previous rulings on the subject.
Obviously, voter ID opponents are overjoyed. It’s been a long, tangled path to the Supreme Court, with lawsuits moving up and down the state federal court systems.
Earlier this week, it seemed like all hope was lost.
A three-judge federal appeals panel upheld the voter ID law, in a decision that took many insulting, nasty swipes at those who don’t have an ID and didn’t consider—at all—the logistics of implementing this law at such a late date.
Did I mention that those three judges were all appointed by Republican presidents?
So in some ways I wonder if the Supreme Court justices made this decision to slap back the lower court. Monday’s appellate court ruling was so nasty, and didn’t adhere to Supreme Court precedent. Would the justices have allowed that to stand?
Also interesting is that Chief Justice John Roberts joined in the 6-3 majority decision.
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That gives their emergency decision a bit more heft, if you ask me.
So the Nov. 4 election will be conducted in the same manner as all other elections (barring one low-turnout election in 2012) in Wisconsin.
And Scott Walker won two statewide elections under those rules.
What’s he so worried about this time around?
