It was recently decided that workers and students at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) could use digital ID cards to vote. This caused Republicans to sue the North Carolina State Board of Elections (NCSBE).
The Republican Party of North Carolina and the Republican National Committee (RNC) filed a lawsuit in Wake County Superior Court on Thursday.
This was just a few weeks after the North Carolina board of elections voted 3-2 to allow the use of digital IDs provided by UNC. The people who filed the case said that the digital IDs that schools give out don’t follow state voter ID law.
In the case, the GOP committees said, “The law does not allow the NCSBE to expand the circumstances of what is an acceptable student identification card from something that can be held in the hand to something that can only be found on a computer system.”
Apple products can handle UNC digital IDs. People who want to can give the cards digitally from their phones. In the case, Republicans said that proper identification, which is what would allow a person to vote, should be “physical, tangible.”
“These real, physical things include, among other things, passports, driver’s licenses, photo ID cards for people who aren’t drivers, registered voter ID cards, military ID cards, veteran ID cards, and tribal enrollment cards,” they said in the case.
“Before registering and accepting voters at in-person poll sites in violation of the law could allow hundreds or thousands of ineligible voters to vote in the upcoming November 5, 2024, election and beyond,” the RNC and the state party said.
The plaintiffs also said that voter photo IDs that are stored electronically might be “easier” to change than “a physical, tangible item that precinct official can hold in her hands and inspect.” As well, they said, “it may be hard for precinct official to be able to see the screen.”
In the 2024 election, North Carolina is expected to be a key state. The state was won by about 1.3% by former President Trump in the 2020 election.
The Hill has talked to the state’s election board.