RNC Unveils Despicable Plan to Disenfranchise Voters in Key State

Republicans have found a new way to try to secure a swing state for Donald Trump: voter disenfranchisement.

On Thursday, the Republican National Committee and North Carolina’s Republican Party sued the states Board of Elections, or NCSBE, to limit acceptable forms of voter identification at the polls this November. The lawsuit argues that students at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill should not be allowed to use a digital form of ID in order to vote.

“The law does not allow the NCSBE to expand the circumstances of what is an acceptable student identification card, beyond a tangible, physical item, to something only found on a computer system,” the GOP argued in the lawsuit. They argued, without evidence, that allowing students and university staff to use their “Mobile UNC One Card” at in-person poll sites “could allow hundreds or thousands of ineligible voters” to cast their ballots. Additionally, they added—again without evidence—that the digital identification shouldn’t be accepted because  it “may be difficult for precinct official[s] to be able to see [the] screen.”

Republicans also filed a separate request for a judge to issue a temporary restraining order or preliminary injunction preventing the use of the mobile ID.

While this may seem like a small story, young Americans are using digital wallets at greater rates. As a joke from earlier this year said, an easy way you can spot a millennial is if they’re carrying a physical wallet with them. And changing voter ID laws at the last minute is sure to have repercussions.

In July, Democratic North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper passed a law to allow voters to use mobile driver’s licenses starting in July 2025, which could now also face legal challenges down the line.

In 2020, Donald Trump won North Carolina by just under 75,000 votes. According to recent numbers, there are more than 30,000 undergraduate and graduate students who attend UNC-Chapel Hill and over 12,000 members of faculty and staff.

In North Carolina, in-person early voting begins October 17.