Wisconsin Voter ID: Plaintiffs' Emergency Application To Justice Kagan Lacks A Key Element

The plaintiffs in Wisconsin's Voter ID case yesterday filed an emergency application with Justice Kagan, the Circuit Justice assigned to the Seventh Circuit, seeking an order vacating the Seventh Circuit's September 12 stay of Judge Adelman's injunction against enforcement of the law, 2011 Wis. Act 23. Justice Kagan has called for a response from the state by next Tuesday.

We have written several times already about the argument in the Seventh Circuit on the merits; that court's stay of the injunction the same day ( here); and the plaintiffs' ultimately unsuccessful effort (for failure to get a sixth vote among the court's ten active judges) to have the full court hear their motion for reconsideration of the stay ( here). The plaintiffs have now turned to the last place from which they can hope for relief, to prevent the Voter ID law from taking effect for the November elections.