Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe on Friday restored [order, PDF] the voting rights of individuals who have completed the terms of incarceration and have been released from supervised probation or parole for any and all felony convictions. Under the Constitution of Virginia [text], the governor has the power to “remove political disabilities consequent upon conviction for [committed] offenses.” The individuals’ civil rights [official website] restored are the following: the right to vote, serve on a jury, run for office, and become a notary public. The governor’s order restores the rights of approximately 206,000 individuals in that state and applies to all Virginians convicted of any felony. The order does not grant automatic right restoration for the future, but McAuliffe has pledged [press release] to issue monthly orders restoring rights. Felon disenfranchisement laws have been found [summary text, PDF] to have a “disproportionately negative impact African American voters and have at times been used intentionally to consolidate and preserve white control over the political process.” Some see this as a strategy [NYT report] to gain more votes for the Democratic Party during the upcoming presidential election by restoring the voting rights of ex-felons who may be mostly African-Americans—a core constituency of Democrats.

Voting rights remain a controversial legal issue in the US, particularly in this election year. This week the Supreme Court unanimously upheld [JURIST report] an Arizona commission’s decisions regard the redistricting of voting districts in the state. Also this week, a panel of federal judges rejected [JURIST report] a motion by Representative Corrine Brown that challenged the current congressional district boundaries in Florida. At the beginning of this week, advocacy organization, Election justice USA filed [JURIST report] a suit in the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York claiming that the state has fraudulently changed the registration of thousands of voters, barring them from voting in the presidential primary. In February a partnership of voting rights groups filed [JURIST report] suit against the executive director of the US Election Assistance Commission alleging that his recent decision limiting the use of national voter registration in Alabama, Kansas, and Georgia deprives eligible voters from the right to vote.