“Confirmed Judges, Confirmed Fears” is a blog series documenting the harmful impact of President Trump’s judges on Americans began to ’ rights and liberties. It includes judges nominated in both his first and second terms.
Three judges nominated by Donald Trump to the Sixth Circuit court of appeals reversed a permanent injunction against a restrictive Tennessee voting law that makes it harder for people convicted of felonies to restore their voting rights. The June 2025 decision in Tennessee Conf of the NAACP v Lee was issued by Trump judges Eric Murphy, Joan Larsen, and John Bush.
What happened in this case?
Tennessee has long had a complicated documentation policy for people who had previously been convicted of felonies and seek to restore their right to vote. In 2020, the state NAACP challenged the state policy as violating the National Voting Rights Act (NVRA). The district court granted summary judgment to the NAACP and permanently enjoined the policy’s continued use. The state appealed to the Sixth Circuit, which stayed the district court’s order pending the appeal. A key issue was whether the NAACP had standing to bring the case, as the district court had ruled.
How did the three Trump judges rule and why is the result harmful?
In a unanimous opinion by Trump judge Murphy, joined by Trump judges Larsen and Bush, the Sixth Circuit reversed the lower court and ruled that based on the current record, the NAACP did not have standing to bring the case. Murphy maintained that even though the NAACP had spent money and devoted resources to re-establishing the right to vote of people convicted of felonies, its failure to cite any specific people it helped to regain the right to vote meant that it did not have standing under Supreme Court precedent.
The case is not yet over, since it was sent back to the lower court, where the NAACP can seek to introduce the type of evidence the Trump appellate judges criticized the group for not introducing. For now, at least, the ruling clearly harms efforts to restore the right to vote in Tennessee and may well hurt groups like the NAACP in challenging other state or other conduct based on diversion of resources. The decision also illustrates the importance of our federal courts to health, welfare and justice and the significance of having fair-minded judges on the federal bench.