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The Supreme Court upheld a pair of Arizona voting rules against Democratic claims that the state discriminated against minority voters, a decision that could make it more difficult to challenge new state efforts to tighten election regulations. The court, in a 6-3 opinion by Justice Samuel Alito, ruled Arizona was on solid legal ground in enforcing rules that prohibit third parties from collecting mail-in ballots and disallow votes cast in the wrong precinct. (Kendall and Bravin, 7/1)

Justice Elena Kagan ripped her conservative colleagues on the Supreme Court on Thursday in a blistering 41-page dissent, accusing them of ignoring the legislative intent of the 1965 Voting Rights Act as well as the high court’s own precedents. ... Kagan said the court in its 6-3 decision penned by stalwart conservative Justice Samuel Alito gave “a cramped reading” to the “broad language” of the voting law and used that reading to uphold two Arizona voting restrictions “that discriminate against minority voters.” One is a 2016 Arizona law that prohibits the transporting of another person’s absentee ballot to election officials unless done by a family member or caregiver, a practice which critics call “ballot harvesting” but proponents say is necessary to give voters with limited mobility or in remote areas access to the polls.

Political scientists and voting rights advocates reacted with horror on Thursday after the Supreme Court upheld two Republican-backed voting restrictions in Arizona, the latest in a series of blows the high court has dealt to the 1965 Voting Rights Act under Chief Justice John Roberts. One of the Arizona provisions allowed election officials to discard provisional ballots cast if a voter showed up at the wrong precinct. Another barred so-called ballot harvesting, when third-party groups collect and deliver absentee ballots. (Wilson, 7/1)