Justice Allison Riggs (4:22)

Yeah, thanks so much for having me, Ben. Six months to the day after election day, after North Carolina voters spoke, a federal district court judge issued what was an enormous victory, not just for North Carolina voters, but for voters all across the country. This has been a tough six months, but I'm no stranger to tough fights. And we knew all along that the threat here was existential, that if people with power can toss out ballots selectively after an election, cancel the votes of people they, they think don't didn't vote for them, that democracy cannot exist in those conditions. And so we have been fighting tooth and nail in a courtroom, not just for North Carolina service members, that that was a worthy enough fight. For sure, North Carolina service members deserve to have someone standing up to defend them the way they defend us. But we knew that this would open the door to, to enormous mischief and frivolous challenges after election day across the country. So we're very gratified by the ruling and stand ready to continue the fight if need be. But really this, this should, should have decisively ended it yesterday.

Ben (5:46)

Can you remind our viewers what these 65,000 votes were that were being challenged? I know there was one group of 60, then there was another 5,000 that were the military overseas. And, and maybe you can describe also what Jefferson Griffin and the Republicans were doing to like specifically one just target your race, not the other races, not the Trump race, not the other congressional races. Those were apparently fine. And then they micro targeted Democratic areas only to try to change the vote after the fact. Can you go into that yeah.

Justice Allison Riggs (6:24)

So the legal terminology for what this was is throwing spaghetti at the wall. My opponent decided to challenge reached as high as 68,000 eligible North Carolinians who cast lawful ballots. The biggest bucket, 60,000 of them, were voters who were alleged to have information missing from their voter file, including a Social Security number or a driver's license number. But that information is not required under federal law. Federal law actually provides that those voters can vote if they Show a certain ID. My parents were in that bucket of 60,000. My dad is 30 years retired military. He and my mom retired down to North Carolina to be near to me and my sister. They went to register in person using their military IDs. Retired military IDs, which don't have driver's license or Social Security numbers on it. The Department of Defense decided years ago not to put Social Security Security numbers on military id. So my parents followed every, every rule, did everything right, as did the rest of the 60,000 voters in that bucket. Over the course of the last six months, we were able to knock out that challenge. Even the North Carolina Supreme Court said those voters did nothing wrong and we won't disenfranchise them. What has persisted has been the selective targeting of voters who use a federal mechanism to vote. It's called the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Voting Act. It's a federal law designed to address how hard it is for military members and their family to vote when they are serving away from home or overseas. Upwards of 5,500 of those voters in four counties only were challenged. So these are people who used a specific, identifiable kind of voting because they were service members, members, or working overseas for certain reasons. My opponent, there's 100 counties in North Carolina, he picked four of the most Democratic counties and challenged the military and overseas voters in those four counties only, and said they should be challenged in other, more red counties. No problem. And mine was the only race uncertified from the 2024 election cycle. It still is. But no complaints about Donald Trump winning North Carolina in the presidential race. A number of Democrats and Republicans won up and down the ballot. North Carolina is a very purple state, but this was really troubling, inconsistent, challenging. And it really is reminiscent of the arguments in Bush v. Gore, where in the 2000 election, the question was, well, do we do something in a handful of Florida counties that we're not doing in other counties? And subjecting military voters to the presumption that their vote is invalid unless they jump through hurdles, even when they may be serving on a submarine underseas in the Atlantic Ocean, that that is unconstitutional. And we were gratified that the federal court yesterday upheld every one of the arguments we made about why these challenges violated the federal Constitution.

Ben (10:00)

We've talked about this concept of the laboratories of autocracy, how sometimes you're seeing these MAGA Republicans try out these playbooks in states and say, okay, well, we can do voter suppression here. We could gerrymander here. And now, even if we lose the election after doing all of those things, we can basically just kind of redo it. We can target certain areas, throw out 65,000 votes. And it's why I think, you know, to your point, this has national implications here. If this stands, they then kind of roll this out, this test balloon everywhere else, kind of. I just want to show the video of. Want to show the video of your parents, because I think it brings it home when they're both like, if you add our ages up together, we've been voting for like 100 years. Of course we're going to vote for our daughter. What are you talking. You're throwing out our votes for our daughter. What do you mean? Here, just watch this video. This is for our viewers.

Justice Allison Riggs (10:55)

Yeah, well, we were thoroughly shocked to find out there even was a list. And then to find out that we were on the list when we have voted successfully for 50 years without an issue.

Justice Allison Riggs' Parent (11:06)

And combined we have voted religiously for over. Over a hundred years, the two of us together. And this is the first time the ballots ever been challenged. And. And I know that my daughter had spoken a lot about recognizing voter suppression when she sees it. I can tell you this does not feel like election integrity personally. This feels like voter suppression when it intends involves us and a very important election to us personally. It involves our daughter.

Ben (11:42)

Well, I'll tell you, Justice Riggs, so my parents were very proud when I graduated Georgetown Law. They were a little bit curious when I became a podcaster. But I got them back on my team now and they're proud again. But I can only imagine you got proud parents. You're a Supreme Court justice in the state of North Carolina. They go out to vote for you in the election, and then they find out that. And they're going to be so careful. How could you be more careful than the parents voted for them? I bet you they looked at it, they took photos of it, they mounted it on the wall. I bet you it was one and their vote was one that was initially going to be thrown out. So if it happened to them, just imagine what's happening overseas and everybody else. So I'll let you address that. But just as we wrap up, where do we go from here? What happens next?

Justice Allison Riggs (12:32)

Yeah, I mean, I have always represented voters in fights to make sure that their right to vote counted. I was a civil rights and voting rights attorney before joining the bench. And my parents experience only reminded me of what I already knew, that there are real people at the other end of these attempts to put political, personal political ambition over the rule of law and the Constitution. I put my hand on a Bible two years ago, raised my hand and swore an oath to uphold the federal and state constitutions. And it's been my honor to fight for North Carolina voters. It's been my honor to make sure that democracy carries the day across the country and that nothing I stood hand in hand with voters in North Carolina who said democracy is not going to die here in North Carolina, not on our watch. And I hope this fight is over. But if it's not, we'll keep fighting. We need people, voters to decide elections, not politicians and not courts. And it's a good day here in North Carolina. But we will not let our guard down. We will never, ever give up in fighting to keep hands, keep power in the hands of the people.

Ben (13:55)

North Carolina Supreme Court Justice Allison Riggs right off the big decision by the district court in North Carolina. Great to have you on.

Justice Allison Riggs (14:05)

Thank you so much everybody.

Ben (14:07)

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