Chelsea Michelle Ann Cox, a Jamaican national living in Broward County, Florida, voted in the 2020 presidential election. She wasn't an American citizen. Federal prosecutors charged her under 18 U.S.C. § 611, a law Congress passed in 1996 as part of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act. The law makes it a federal crime for non-citizens to vote in federal elections, punishable by up to one year in prison and fines.

A Biden-appointed judge just threw the whole thing out.

U.S. District Judge David Leibowitz, who sits in the Southern District of Florida and was confirmed in 2024 on a 64-33 bipartisan vote, issued a 31-page opinion ruling that 18 U.S.C. § 611 is unconstitutional. His reasoning: "The Constitution commits to the States, and the States alone, the general power to set voter qualifications in federal elections." He cited Article I, Article II, the 17th Amendment, and the Supreme Court's 1970 ruling in Oregon v. Mitchell.

"When you're prosecuted based on a law that Congress did not have the authority to pass," Leibowitz wrote, "the prosecution cannot stand."

So a federal law that has been on the books for 30 years — one that says non-citizens cannot vote in American elections — is now, according to one federal judge, something Congress never had the authority to enact in the first place. The charges against Cox were dismissed.

James Percival, General Counsel at the Department of Homeland Security, responded on social media: "A Biden appointed judge in Florida says that federal bans on noncitizen voting are unconstitutional. The thing that never happens is now 'constitutionally protected activity!'"

Senator Mike Lee also denounced the ruling publicly.

The constitutional argument isn't frivolous on its face — states do set voter qualifications, and Oregon v. Mitchell did address the boundaries of federal power over elections. But Judge Leibowitz's interpretation takes a narrow precedent about age-based voting qualifications and stretches it into a blanket prohibition on Congress protecting federal elections from voters who aren't Americans. Oregon v. Mitchell didn't say Congress can't prevent non-citizens from voting. It said Congress can't lower the voting age in state elections. The distance between those two propositions is a canyon, and Leibowitz built a 31-page bridge across it.

The timing is the part that matters practically. The 2026 midterms are less than a month away. Every state with a competitive race now has a federal judge on record saying the national government lacks the constitutional authority to keep non-citizens off federal ballots. The ruling applies to one case in one district, but the legal reasoning is a template. Any defense attorney in any federal non-citizen voting prosecution can now cite Leibowitz's opinion and move to dismiss.

Thirty years. The law survived every administration from Clinton through Trump's second term. It survived because the principle seemed obvious enough that nobody seriously challenged it — of course Congress can make it a crime for non-citizens to vote in congressional and presidential elections.

Judge Leibowitz was confirmed 64-33. The vote count is in the Congressional Record.