NASHVILLE -- A federal judge Tuesday denied the City of Memphis' request to force election officials to accept the city's new photo library cards for voting purposes in Thursday's elections.
U.S. District Court Judge Aleta Trauger said after a two-hour hearing she did not believe the city's arguments that the library cards qualified under state law were persuasive and did not believe the issue would succeed on the merits later in court.
She questioned some provisions of the Tennessee statute, however, and said they would likely be burdensome on the elderly but declined the city's request for a temporary injunction ordering the library cards to be allowed.
The city had asked for an injunction ordering the Shelby County Election Commission to accept the new photo ID cards issued by the Memphis Public Library as the photo ID cards required under state law to vote. Mayor A C Wharton asked the library to create the photo cards after he became concerned that many Memphis residents without government-issued photo IDs would be prevented from voting this year, according to testimony in an initial hearing last week.
In that hearing, another judge declined the city's request for a temporary restraining order demanding state officials stop instructing Shelby election officials to not accept the card.
The lawsuit was filed by the City of Memphis and a Memphis registered voter, Daphne Turner-Golden.
