ALEXANDRIA, VA (July 17, 2026) –The Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF) appealed its Hawaii voter roll access case to the Supreme Court this week. This pits the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals against the First Circuit’s finding that PILF can access statewide voter rolls, per the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA).
Congress enacted the NRVA to allow public access to voter registration documents, including a statewide voter roll, according to the First Circuit Court of Appeals. The federal law calls for public access to “all records concerning the implementation of programs and activities conducted for the purpose of ensuring the accuracy and currency of official lists of eligible voters…” The Ninth Circuit disagreed, arguing the First Circuit “gives too much weight to the words ‘all’ and ‘concerning’.”
In other words, the First Circuit says the public can see the voter roll and every retained document used to keep the roll accurate. The Ninth Circuit disallows access to the final voter roll maintenance product: the voter roll.
“Congress said the public is entitled to all records concerning voter list maintenance. ‘All’ means ‘all’,” said PILF President and General Counsel J. Christian Adams. “The statewide voter file is exactly what Congress requires be made public.”
PILF attorneys for this case are Joe Nixon, Sam Swanson, and Carolyn Valdes.
Read the latest case filings here.
The Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF) is the nation’s only public interest law firm dedicated wholly to election integrity. The Foundation exists to assist states and others to aid the cause of election integrity and fight against lawlessness in American elections. Drawing on numerous experts in the field, PILF seeks to protect the right to vote and preserve the Constitutional framework of American elections.
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