[Updated] Eric Holder Revels In Voter ID Law Victory Before Stepping Down

Barack Obama will be nominating someone to replace Eric Holder after the mid-term elections. Until then Holder is reveling in a Justice Department victory over voter ID laws.

In Texas, a federal judge struck down the state’s strict voter ID laws as violating the Voting Rights Act.

Eric Holder told MSNBC that the move shows “the wisdom of the Justice Department’s strategy of using the Voting Rights Act (VRA) to challenge restrictive voting laws.”

He added that the GOP fondness for voting restrictions “hearkens back to a dark time in our history.”

The Justice Department’s strategy is more adaptive than innovative. Earlier last year, the Supreme Court ruled that certain aspects of the 2006 Congressional re-authorization of the Voter Rights Act exceeded Congress’ constitutional authority. The decision allowed for voter pre-clearance laws and both Mississippi and Texas announced plans for voter ID laws within hours of the ruling.

The Supreme Court essentially took away the authority of section 4(b) of the VRA, which allowed Eric Holder a relatively free hand to remove any restrictions on voting that might endanger citizens’ rights.

To conform to the ruling, while still maintaining a close vigilance on voting restrictions, Holder relied on the unaffected section 2 of the VRA, which is direct for a U.S. law.

“No voting qualifications or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or procedure shall be imposed or applied by any State or political subdivision to deny or abridge the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color.”

Eric Holder explained that although it wasn’t easy to use to Section 2, but the department wasn’t going to give up.

“A lot of questions were raised about our ability to do what we did in Texas, but we decided after Shelby that as a department we were not going to just throw up our hands. And we pushed ahead by using Section 2 … people said it was going to be more difficult, it was going to be impossible to do.”

In the end it paid off, with U.S. District Court Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos ruling that the Texas voter ID law was an unconstitutional poll tax, since people would have to spend money to get a government mandated identification.

Now Eric Holder is quickly approaching the end of his Justice Department career. President Obama will keep Holder on until after the mid-terms. According to the Guardian, Obama wants to keep the nomination out of the election-year process.

Whoever replaces Eric Holder will have to continue the increasingly difficult fight against voter restrictions.

[Update]

Eric Holder’s victory interview with MSNBC may have been premature.

The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals has blocked the ruling of Nelva Gonzales Ramos, saying that the Texas voter ID law is constitutional.

The attorney for the plaintiffs, Gerry Hebert said in an email, “We are going to the U.S. Supreme Court.”

The supreme court will be the final appeal to destroy the Texas law.

The deputy director for the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center said, “This discriminatory law will make it harder for hundreds of thousands of voters, many of whom are minorities, to make their voices heard this November.”

Looks like Eric Holder still has some work to do before he leaves.

[Image Credit: The White House/Wikimedia Commons]