By Sasha Hupka || Arizona Republic
U.S. District Court Judge Michael Liburdi will not approve an emergency injunction to stop ballot drop box monitors from gathering outside Arizona voter locations.
The federal judge’s decision comes days after two voting rights groups filed a legal challenge targeting conservative group Clean Elections USA, which has organized drop box surveillance in the Phoenix area, and its founder, Melody Jennings.
The Arizona Alliance for Retired Americans, a progressive grassroots organization that supports seniors’ issues, and Voto Latino, a nonprofit focused on getting out the young Latino vote, claimed in court documents that Jennings coordinated a “campaign of vigilante voter intimidation.”
The groups argued that a quick decision on the emergency order was necessary, with voting underway and Election Day fast approaching.
Jennings, who lives in Oklahoma, was not present during a Wednesday court hearing. Veronica Lucero, an attorney representing Jennings, said the proposed emergency order is too broad and would violate Jennings’ rights.
Liburdi wrote in his decision that he struggled to “craft a meaningful form of injunctive relief that does not violate Defendants’ First Amendment rights and those of the drop box observers.”
“While there are serious questions implicated, the Court cannot provide preliminary injunctive relief without infringing core constitutional rights,” he wrote. “A preliminary injunction cannot issue on these facts, but Arizona Alliance is invited to return to this Court with any new evidence that Defendants have engaged in unlawful voter intimidation.”
Liburdi also ordered that Voto Latino be removed from the suit, saying they have “not shown any other concrete or particularized injury.”
A separate, but similar, lawsuit was filed Tuesday by Protect Democracy on behalf of The League of Women Voters of Arizona. In addition to Clean Elections USA, it named Lions of Liberty, a right-wing group in Yavapai County. That group said Thursday that it would halt monitoring outdoor ballot drop boxes in response to the legal challenge.
