The U.S. Supreme Court has rejected a request from opponents of Texas’ voter identification law to scrap the measure even before an appeals court has ruled on the law.
Latino advocacy groups and Democratic lawmakers have said the law is discriminatory and filed a lawsuit to block it. So far, the law has remained in effect as the legal wrangling continues. The law’s opponents asked the Supreme Court to scrap the law during that process, but the court so far has refused.
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will hear the case next month. The Supreme Court indicated that it might consider revisiting the request to suspend the law depending on the progress of that case.
The Texas law requires voters to provide certain government-issued photo identification. Opponents of the law say that more than 600,000 eligible voters don’t have the required ID, and that those voters contain a disproportionate share of black and Hispanic Texans. State officials, however, contend there have been no problems with large numbers of voters being turned away for lack of the required ID.