Yesterday, the U.S. Department of Justice filed an amicus brief in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit in support of NAACP Colorado, League of Women Voters of Colorado, and Mi Familia Vota. These groups, represented by Free Speech For People and co-counsel Bryan Sells, filed their appeal brief last week, challenging the district court’s ruling that the United States Election Integrity Plan (USEIP) and three of its leaders should not be held responsible for voter intimidation where the group’s agents, some of them armed, used public voter lists to interrogate voters in their homes after the 2020 election, publicized their “findings,” and threatened severe consequences for anyone they believed to be involved in election fraud.

NAACP Colorado, LWV Colorado, and Mi Familia Vota’s appeal brief argued, among other points, that the district court wrongly dismissed claims against USEIP before trial. The district court ruled that USEIP cannot be sued under either the Voting Rights Act of 1965 or the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1971 solely because the organization had never incorporated. The DOJ’s amicus brief supports these arguments, demonstrating that both laws cover unincorporated associations; that unincorporated associations, just like private individuals, can be sued to protect voters from intimidation; and that the district court’s decision cuts against decisions by other courts across the country. As the DOJ wrote, “[t]he district court erred in effectively holding that the Ku Klux Klan Act does not apply to the Ku Klux Klan.”

The Voting Rights Act and the Ku Klux Klan Act provide crucial protections to voters. And it is clear from the language of the laws, the intent of the legislators who wrote them, and subsequent court decisions across the country that unincorporated organizations like USEIP can be held liable under both.

Read the amicus brief here.

Read the plaintiffs-appellants appeal brief here.

Read more about the case here.