Opinion ID: 3173811
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Cross-Appeal: Applicability of NVRA

Text: We decline to revisit our prior decision that NVRA does not apply to Puerto Rico. Although plaintiffs are correct that we reached that decision in the context of a request for preliminary relief, our examination of the statute was neither tentative nor incomplete. We concluded that [t]he textual signals and the legislative history, taken together, constitute persuasive evidence that Congress did not intend to include Puerto Rico as a 'State' under the NVRA. Colón-Marrero, 703 F.3d at 138.10 Indeed, the district court and parties have treated our analysis as decisive, and plaintiffs essentially admit in their brief that they reiterate their NVRA statutory construction argument out of an abundance of caution. To eliminate any ambiguity, we now explicitly reaffirm our earlier determination that NVRA does not apply to Puerto Rico for the reasons outlined in our November 2012 opinion. See Colón-Marrero, 703 F.3d at 137-38.
We also find unavailing plaintiffs' theory that they are entitled to the protections provided by NVRA because excluding Puerto Rico from the statute's coverage violates the Equal Protection Clause. Plaintiffs assert that, absent NVRA's 10NVRA defines State as a State of the United States and the District of Columbia. 52 U.S.C. § 20502(4). - 12 - protections, citizens residing in Puerto Rico have a version of the right to vote that is unconstitutionally inferior to the right afforded citizens residing in the fifty states and the District of Columbia. Plaintiffs first suggest that Congress's decision not to apply NVRA to Puerto Rico must be examined under strict scrutiny. They rely on the fact that a legislative classification is subject to strict scrutiny if it impermissibly interferes with the exercise of a fundamental right, Mass. Bd. of Ret. v. Murgia, 427 U.S. 307, 312 (1976), and that the right to vote is of the most fundamental significance under our constitutional structure, Ill. State Bd. of Elections v. Socialist Workers Party, 440 U.S. 173, 184 (1979). But a necessary prerequisite to strict scrutiny is a showing that a fundamental right has been burdened, see Romer v. Evans, 517 U.S. 620, 631 (1996), and the plaintiffs have failed at the threshold to demonstrate how NVRA's exclusion of Puerto Rico burdens their right to vote. The mere fact that a statute concerns voting does not establish that the statute infringes on a fundamental right. See Igartua de la Rosa v. United States, 32 F.3d 8, 10 & n.2 (1st Cir. 1994) (per curiam). Absent a showing that NVRA substantially burdens the rights of Puerto Rico residents to vote in federal elections -- and no such showing has even been attempted here -- strict scrutiny does not apply. - 13 - In the absence of strict scrutiny, plaintiffs' equal protection challenge prompts rational basis review. See Romer, 517 U.S. at 631. Plaintiffs' claim founders on this standard. To be sure, NVRA prescribes more restrictive deactivation prerequisites than does Article 6.012 and, in that respect, arguably offers greater protection to the federal voting rights of mainland citizens. Yet, significant factual differences exist between federal elections in Puerto Rico and in the jurisdictions covered by NVRA. Unlike in the states and the District of Columbia, general federal elections in Puerto Rico occur on a fouryear, rather than two-year, cycle. See 48 U.S.C. § 891 (setting a four-year term for the Resident Commissioner). Article 6.012 thus allows election officials to remove individuals from active voting rolls after the same four-year period prescribed by NVRA - - albeit after one election rather than two. In addition, the only federal election in Puerto Rico is for the office of Resident Commissioner, a non-voting position in Congress. Unlike the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico does not choose Presidential electors. See U.S. Const. art. II, § 1, cl.2; id. amend. XXIII. Plaintiffs do not explain why Congress could not rely on those distinctions to refrain from extending NVRA's obligations to the federal election process in the Commonwealth.11 11We note, however, that Congress via HAVA later imposed the same prerequisites for removing Puerto Rico residents from the - 14 - We thus conclude that plaintiffs have not articulated a viable constitutional challenge to NVRA based on the exclusion of Puerto Rico from its scope.