David Leibowitz properly curbs congressional overreach in Miami

By Adele Rutherford · Reporting from Atlanta · October 3, 2026

A federal judge rightly dismissed an indictment against Chelsea Cox because the Constitution leaves voter qualifications to the states, not to shifting majorities in Congress.

When procedure yields to power

U.S. District Judge David Leibowitz did not write an opinion to please the crowd. Appointed by former President Joe Biden, the judge took up a federal statute, 18 U.S.C. § 611, and addressed jurisdiction. According to CBS News and Bloomberg Law News, the court dismissed a federal criminal case against Chelsea Cox. Cox was charged with illegally voting in the 2020 presidential election. Prosecutors alleged that Cox overstayed a tourist visa and used a fraudulent birth certificate from the U.S. Virgin Islands to register to vote in Florida.

Judge Leibowitz ruled that the statute is unconstitutional. He wrote that under the U.S. Constitution, only individual states possess the authority to set voter qualifications. Congress lacks that power. Upholding the prosecution would allow Congress to establish its own special electorate, divorced from what Florida or any other state decides.

The weakness of the government's hand

The Justice Department defended the law by relying on the Elections Clause, but the argument could not bear the weight. Judge Leibowitz noted that the government's principal defense of the statute invoked a single Supreme Court case that is very weak.

Reuters and Al Jazeera report that the case against Cox is not an isolated glitch. Other similar cases remain pending nationwide. Most defendants were lawful permanent residents who registered by mistake or on incorrect official advice. None stood accused of conspiring to sway an election or taking payment to vote. Bruce Udolf, the lawyer for Chelsea Cox, welcomed the ruling.

The broader legal mechanism mirrors Oregon v. Mitchell. There, the Supreme Court distinguished between federal authority to regulate the manner of elections and the state's reserved power to determine voter qualifications. When the government polices voter qualifications through a federal criminal statute rather than leaving the franchise to local authorities, it adopts a flawed architecture.

Testing the tool against tomorrow

The Justice Department announced it will appeal the ruling. The architects of federal power must consider who will hold this tool tomorrow. If Congress can enact a criminal statute defining who may cast a ballot in federal elections, a different Congress can rewrite those definitions.

The court-appointed amicus curiae, former Solicitor General Paul Clement, found that Congress overstepped constitutional bounds when it enacted the statute. Judge Leibowitz made clear that Florida can and does prosecute such offenses under state law. The ruling does not strip states of their authority to govern voter rolls or remove unlawful voters.

The ruling applies directly to Chelsea Cox, leaving other cases to wind through a skeptical appellate landscape. But the principle remains absolute. A rule that only works while your allies hold power was never a rule at all.

This dismissal must be affirmed on appeal. The Tenth Amendment leaves the definition of the electorate where it has always belonged: with the states.

David Leibowitz properly curbs congressional overreach in Miami

When procedure yields to power

The weakness of the government's hand

Testing the tool against tomorrow

Sources