Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/19-1257_g204.pdf
Page Number: 74

30 

BRNOVICH v. DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE 

KAGAN, J., dissenting 

State’s  Native  American  citizens  need  to  travel  long  dis-
tances to use the mail.  Both policies violate Section 2, on a 
straightforward application of its text.  Considering the “to-
tality of circumstances,” both “result in” members of some 
races having “less opportunity than other members of the 
electorate to participate in the political process and to elect 
a representative of their choice.”  §10301(b).  The majority 
reaches the opposite conclusion because it closes its eyes to 
the facts on the ground.10 

A 
  Arizona’s  out-of-precinct  policy  requires  discarding  any 
Election  Day  ballot  cast  elsewhere  than  in  a  voter’s  as-
signed precinct.  Under the policy, officials throw out every 
choice in every race—including national or statewide races 
(e.g., for President or Governor) that appear identically on 
every precinct’s ballot.  The question is whether that policy 
unequally  affects  minority  citizens’  opportunity  to  cast  a 
vote. 
  Although the majority portrays Arizona’s use of the rule 
as  “unremarkable,”  ante,  at  26,  the  State  is  in  fact  a  na-
tional  aberration  when  it  comes  to  discarding  out-of- 
precinct  ballots.    In  2012,  about  35,000  ballots  across  the 
country  were  thrown  out  because  they  were  cast  at  the 
wrong precinct.  See U. S. Election Assistance Commission, 
2012 Election Administration and Voting Survey 53 (2013).  
Nearly one in three of those discarded votes—10,979—was 
cast  in  Arizona.   Id., at  52.   As  the  Court of  Appeals con-
cluded, and the chart below indicates, Arizona threw away 
ballots in that year at 11 times the rate of the second-place 
discarder (Washington State).  Democratic Nat. Committee 
v.  Hobbs,  948  F. 3d  989,  1001  (CA9  2020);  see  App.  72.  
Somehow the majority labels that difference “marginal[ ],”  
—————— 

10 Because I would affirm the Court of Appeals’ holding that the effects 
of these policies violate Section 2, I need not pass on that court’s alterna-
tive holding that the laws were enacted with discriminatory intent.