Voter Purges After Shelby

Abstract

In Shelby County v. Holder (570 U.S. 529 (2013)), the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the “coverage formula” in Section 4b of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) that determined which jurisdictions had to presubmit changes in their election policies for federal approval. This ruling allowed covered counties full control over their election laws for the first time in 40 years. We engage the question of whether counties that had previously been “covered” purged voters at a higher rate than noncovered counties after the coverage formula was struck down. We find increases in purge rate of between 1.5 and 4.5 points in formerly covered jurisdictions post-Shelby, compared with counties that had not been subject to preclearance. Most of the increase came immediately, as the effect in 2014 is substantively and significantly higher than that in 2016. These findings suggest that while counties may have aggressively purged voters in 2014—the first election after the coverage formula’s demise—they may have tempered this behavior thereafter.