State and national Republicans have filed another lawsuit against the North Carolina State Board of Elections, this time challenging the board's decision to allow University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill students and employees to use their university-issued digital identification cards to vote.
The board approved the use of the IDs in a 3-2 party-line vote on Aug. 20. The board had previously given approval for a number of other IDs, including ones from Duke and Campbell universities.
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The Republican National Committee and the North Carolina Republican Party filed a lawsuit Thursday in Wake County challenging the decision, saying that the digital ID doesn't meet state law.
The November election will be the first general election under the state's 2018 voter ID law, which had been held up in the courts until recently. In 2022, the Republican majority of the state Supreme Court reversed a 2021 ruling by a then-Democratic majority holding that voter ID was racially discriminatory and unconstitutional.
The ID rules were used in the 2023 municipal elections and March's primary elections. Fewer than 500 voters out of 1.8 million voters had their ballots thrown out in March because of ID problems, WRAL previously reported.
The lawsuit says that the state board previously wrote that "an image of a photo ID, either as a photocopy or a photo on a mobile device, is not one of the permitted forms of photo ID when voting in person."
It argues that the "UNC digital identification exists as an electronic record on a computer device" and, thus, should not be accepted.
During the Aug. 20 elections board meeting, Lindsey Wakely, the board's acting general counsel, said that the UNC One Card is "an official credential, not simply a photo of a physical card."
Democrats on the board said that UNC went through specific measures to gain approval from the state board, including the displaying of an expiration date.
But Republican board member Stacy Eggers IV said during the meeting that it was confusing and inconsistent "to say that a mobile app is an identification but a photo on the mobile app is not an identification." Eggers also raised issues about the ability for poll workers to photocopy an ID or to take possession of a voter's phone.
Eggers and fellow Republican Kevin Lewis argued that the One Card is a mobile app and not a digital ID and that the law is clear.
"The language of this statute doesn't require any interpretation, it just requires adherence," Lewis said.
Republicans have filed a series of lawsuits against the state board in recent weeks ahead of the Nov. 5 general election.