Judge Rejects Kansas Law Requiring Voters to Show Proof of Citizenship

A restrictive law on voting in Kansas championed by Kris W. Kobach, the secretary of state, was struck down on Monday by a federal judge who said Kobach had failed during a trial to show evidence of widespread voter fraud.

The ruling was a blow to Kobach, a Republican who has emerged as a national figure on voting limits, a candidate for governor of Kansas and an ally of President Donald Trump in part by claiming that large numbers of noncitizens have cast ballots in U.S. elections. Experts on election law say that there is no evidence that voter fraud is a pervasive problem.

For Kansas voters, the decision means that in elections this fall, people will not be required to provide proof of their citizenship in order to register to vote, as required under a Kansas law passed in 2011.

U.S. District Judge Julie A. Robinson of Kansas, who presided over the trial earlier this year in which Kobach represented himself, said in her 188-page ruling that while there was evidence of a “small number of noncitizen registrations in Kansas, it is largely explained by administrative error, confusion, or mistake.”

During the trial in March in Kansas City, Kansas, Kobach argued that while there had been a relatively small number of noncitizens in Kansas who had tried to vote, he believed that they were only “the tip of the iceberg.”

In her ruling, Robinson dismissed Kobach’s claim. “Instead, the Court draws the more obvious conclusion that there is no iceberg; only an icicle, largely created by confusion and administrative error,” she wrote.

She ordered Kobach to instruct all state and county elections officers that people trying to register to vote in Kansas do not need to present proof of citizenship in order to complete their registration.

Under the 2011 law, Kansas lawmakers had approved one of the strictest voting measures in the country. The law went into effect in 2013, requiring people registering to vote to show a document from an approved list, such as a birth certificate or passport. The American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit against Kobach in 2016 on behalf of the League of Women Voters and individual Kansans, arguing that the law disenfranchised people who were attempting to register legally but did not have access to the required documents.

Kobach, who is seeking the Republican nomination for governor in an August primary, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. He is facing Gov. Jeff Colyer, a Republican who succeeded Sam Brownback in January.

Dale Ho, director of the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project, applauded the ruling. “This decision is a stinging rebuke of Kris Kobach, and the centerpiece of his voter suppression efforts: a show-me-your-papers law that has disenfranchised tens of thousands of Kansans,” Ho said in a statement.

In April, Robinson held Kobach in contempt for disobeying orders to notify thousands of Kansans in 2016 that they were registered to vote.

The judge also took Kobach to task for his conduct as a lawyer during the trial, saying that he violated rules “that are designed to prevent prejudice and surprise at trial.”

Kobach “chose to represent his own office in this matter, and as such, had a duty to familiarize himself with the governing rules of procedure, and to ensure as the lead attorney on this case that his discovery obligations were satisfied despite his many duties as a busy public servant,” Robinson wrote.

On Monday, she ordered that Kobach be required to complete six hours of legal education. Those six hours “must pertain to federal or Kansas civil rules of procedure or evidence,” she wrote.