City to appeal strike down of non-citizen voting law

The city is appealing a June decision from a Staten Island judge to strike down the city’s non-citizen voting bill. Eagle file photo by Jacob Kaye

By Jacob Kaye

A decision from a Staten Island judge that struck down a New York City law to expand the franchise by hundreds of thousands of people will be challenged by attorneys for the city, according to court documents filed on Friday.

The city’s Law Department filed a notice to appeal a late June decision from Richmond County State Supreme Court Justice Ralph Porzio, who sided with Republican petitioners in a lawsuit alleging a city law granting non-citizen New Yorkers the right to vote in municipal elections is unconstitutional.

“This appeal continues the city’s commitment to vigorously defend the law,” a Law Department spokesperson said in a statement to the Eagle.

The biggest piece of voting reform legislation passed on the city level since the start of ranked-choice voting last year, the law allows for noncitizen, lawful permanent residents and those with legal work permits to vote in municipal elections, including in mayoral, comptroller, City Council and borough president races, as long as they have been living in the five boroughs for the past 30 days.

The law, if it withstands legal challenge, will not go into effect until 2023. Baked into the law is a provision that requires the city’s Board of Elections create a separate registration process for non-citizen voters.

The law, known as Local Law 11 or the Our City, Our Vote law, was passed in the last hours of the 2021 City Council’s legislative session. It became law without Mayor Eric Adams’ expressed support – the mayor took no action on the then-bill, allowing it to pass in law 30 days after being passed by the legislature.

The 30 day prevision was at the center of the disagreement surrounding the law, during what was one of the most spirited debates on the council’s floor all year. It was also at the heart of Adams’ wavering support for the bill. The mayor and others said they believed a non-citizen resident should have to live in the city for longer than 30 days before being granted the right to vote.

However, the 30 day provision was not at the heart of Porzio’s June ruling.

Porzio, who has previously ruled against the city’s mask mandate for young children, said in his ruling that although the law would grant voting rights to anywhere from 800,000 to one million New Yorkers, it would come at the expense of citizen voters. The argument was originally made by the plaintiffs, who were led by Staten Island Borough President Vito Fossella and included Queens Republican City Councilmembers Joann Ariola and Vickie Paladino, as well as Democrat City Councilmember Robert Holden.

“[T]he weight of the citizens’ vote will be diluted by municipal voters and candidates and political parties alike will need to reconfigure their campaigns,” Porzio wrote in his decision. “Though the plaintiffs have not suffered any harm today, the harm they will suffer is imminent, and it is reasonably certain that they will suffer their claimed harm if the proposed municipal voters are entitled to vote.”

In his opinion, the judge also wrote that he believes the state constitution only allows for “citizens” to vote.

“The New York State Constitution expressly states that citizens meeting the age and residency requirements are entitled to register and vote in elections,” he said. “There is no statutory ability for the City of New York to issue inconsistent laws permitting on-citizens to vote and exceed the authority granted to it by the New York State Constitution.”

“Though voting is a right that so many citizens take for granted, the City of New York cannot ‘obviate’ the restrictions imposed by the Constitution,” he added.

Ariola, who represents portions of Woodhaven, Richmond Hill, Ozone Park, Howard Beach, Broad Channel and the western half of the Rockaway peninsula, told the Eagle that while she respects city’s decision to appeal, she doesn’t believe they are in the right.

“It is important to remember that the city has the right to appeal any decision made by the court,” Ariola said. “That said, judges are the experts when it comes to determining the legality of any legislation, and their findings on this voting bill stems from their expert understanding of our state constitution.”

“For the city to reject this expert finding in favor of political expediency is a symptom of the larger climate we are in, where laws are being overlooked by some in order to appeal to the loudest members of their base,” the councilmember added. “Those laws were written for a reason, and we need to respect those reasons and avoid straying into the dangerous territory that comes with ignoring them.”

Without Adams’ expressed support for the law, advocates worried that the city wouldn’t jump on the opportunity to challenge Porzio’s ruling, Politico reported.

But on Friday, advocates celebrated the city’s decision to pursue an appeal.

“As expected, the City has appealed the Richmond County Supreme Court's politically motivated ruling overturning the Our City, Our Vote law,” said Murad Awawdeh, the executive director of New York Immigration Coalition, a nonprofit supporting the law. “We are ready and eager to continue defending the right for nearly one million New Yorkers to have a voice in their local democracy.”

“We remain confident that this law is legal and an essential expansion of our democracy as it faces divisive partisan attacks,” Awawdeh added.

The decision was also celebrated by Queens City Councilmember Shekar Krishnan, who represents a large immigrant population in Jackson Heights.

"Last month's decision in a Staten Island court to deny the right of almost one million immigrant New Yorkers to fully participate in our democracy, is shameful,” Krishnan said in a statement to the Eagle. “I'm pleased that New York City will usher the full weight of its Law Department to stand firm with the New York Immigration Coalition and our immigrant communities to appeal this ruling. We are confident we will win."

The Our City, Our Vote law was sponsored by former City Councilmember Ydanis Rodriguez, who now serves in the Adams administration as the commissioner of the Department of Transportation.

In the lead up to the then-bill’s passage, he defended its legal stability.

“If we need to go to Albany, we go to Albany together,” Rodriguez said in November. “We also have right-wing opponents in the City of New York who always become an obstacle when we want to move the immigrants’ rights agenda in this city.”