On Thursday, the Republican Party asked a North Carolina trial judge to stop students and employees at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill from being able to use digital IDs to follow a mostly new photo ID rule. The judge refused.
The Republican National Committee and the state GOP asked for a temporary restraining order, but Judge Keith Gregory turned it down, according to an online court record that was made public after the meeting. The decision can be fought.
The groups sued last week to stop the UNC One Card from being used as a valid ID, saying that state law only lets the State Board of Elections accept physical cards.
The board’s Democratic majority approved the mobile UNC One Card on August 20. It is the first ID that can be posted from a smartphone that the board has allowed.
Along with the board, the Democratic National Committee and a UNC-Chapel Hill student group went to court to fight the stay order. They said the board made the right decision when it said the digital ID met the state law standards for photo and security.
They also said in court briefs that there was nothing in the law that stopped a valid card from not being physical. The lawyers for the DNC wrote that stopping people from using it could make up to 40,000 people who work or go to the school confused or even lose their right to vote.
The UNC on the go One Card is now the standard ID card on campus, but students and full-time workers can still pay a small fee to get a physical card instead. The school said this week that it would make physical cards for students and workers who want to use them as a real ID to vote.
Voters can already show photo IDs from a number of different types, such as their driver’s license, passport, or service ID. The board has also accepted more than 130 types of traditional student and employee IDs that will be valid for voting in 2024.
This includes UNC-Chapel Hill’s physical ID card. The board only allowed UNC-Chapel Hill mobile IDs that worked on Apple phones.
At the time of the case, Republicans said they were concerned that approving the mobile ID “could allow hundreds or thousands of ineligible voters” to vote. They said that an electronic card was simpler to change and more difficult for a police officer to check.
North Carolina is a state that is often very close when it comes to the presidential election.
Before the decision, millions of people who wanted to vote in the fall didn’t have to show an ID because of the state’s 2018 voter ID law. Lawyers fought over the mandate, so it wasn’t carried out the first time until the 2023 low-turnout local elections.
Early voting in person starts on October 17. The first absentee ballots that are requested will likely be sent to military and foreign voters starting Friday.
Early next week, ballots will be mailed to people who registered to vote in-state. Absentee voters must also show a valid ID along with their ticket, or they must fill out a form saying they don’t have one.