An Obama-appointed federal judge has ruled that North Carolina's voter identification law is constitutional, ending a seven-year court fight and handing Republicans a decisive victory on election integrity heading into the 2026 midterms.

Fox News reported that Judge Loretta Biggs upheld the law Thursday in a 134-page decision, finding that plaintiffs failed to prove the voter ID requirement was discriminatory.

Liberal voting rights groups had challenged the law under the 14th and 15th Amendments and the Voting Rights Act. Every claim fell short.

The ruling leaves North Carolina's voter ID law firmly in place, requiring voters to present a photo ID at the polls, just as roughly 55% of the state's voters demanded when they approved the constitutional amendment.

The judge's own words tell the story

What makes this ruling remarkable is who delivered it. Judge Biggs is no conservative warrior. She blocked this very same law in December 2019, issuing a preliminary injunction that prevented North Carolina from enforcing voter ID for the entire 2020 election cycle.

At the time, she cited what she called a "sordid history of racial discrimination and voter suppression" and found the law "impermissibly motivated, at least in part, by discriminatory intent."

Now, after a full trial and years of litigation, Biggs reached the opposite conclusion. Her language Thursday was striking in its deference:

"This Court … concludes that it is compelled by controlling case law to render Judgment in favor of the Defendants."

She went further, explaining why the evidence that once concerned her could not carry the day:

"Case law requires this Court to assign less weight to the historical background. It further requires almost impenetrable deference to the presumption of legislative good faith."

Biggs acknowledged she found evidence suggesting the law could disenfranchise Black and Latino voters, but said the precedents simply did not allow her to invalidate a law on that basis. The legal standard demanded more than the plaintiffs could deliver.

This is a judge appointed by Barack Obama, applying the law as written, conceding that her earlier instincts could not survive the weight of binding precedent. That fact alone dismantles the narrative that voter ID laws are inherently racist instruments designed to suppress minority turnout.

A law the courts keep validating

Biggs is not the first judge to uphold this law. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit reversed her 2019 injunction. The North Carolina Supreme Court upheld the law in a separate state-level case. Every court that has examined the question on the merits has reached the same answer.

Republican state Sen. Phil Berger, who intervened in the case to defend the law, did not mince words:

"Finally. After seven years, we can put to rest any doubt that our state's Voter I.D. law is constitutional."

The bill that the GOP-led Senate crafted in 2018 was never an exotic proposition. It implemented the will of North Carolina voters who approved a constitutional amendment requiring photo ID at the polls. The legislature wrote the enabling legislation. Voters approved the mandate. Courts have now sustained it at every level. That is democracy functioning exactly as designed.

The "Jim Crow 2.0" canard

For years, Democrats have treated voter ID requirements as self-evidently racist. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has called voter ID laws "Jim Crow 2.0." He has described the SAVE America Act, which would require proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote, as "a dagger to the heart of our democracy."

Consider what that framing requires you to believe:

• That the 55% of North Carolina voters who approved the photo ID amendment were motivated by racial animus
• That an Obama-appointed judge who ruled in favor of the law is complicit in voter suppression
• That the 4th Circuit, the state Supreme Court, and now a full federal trial all got it wrong
• That requiring someone to prove they are who they say they are before casting a ballot is an assault on democracy

The accusation collapses under the weight of its own absurdity. You need an ID to board a plane, buy cold medicine, open a bank account, and pick up a package at the post office. Asking for one before someone participates in self-governance is not oppression. It is basic civic hygiene.

Schumer continues to block the SAVE America Act in the Senate after it passed the House. The bill would require a physical document proving U.S. citizenship when registering to vote.

Democrats call this an attack on voting rights. What it actually attacks is the ability of people who are not legally permitted to vote to end up on the rolls.

Momentum for election integrity

President Trump has been advocating stricter voter ID laws nationwide and aggressively urging Congress to pass the SAVE America Act.

This ruling adds judicial weight to that push. When even a judge inclined to block voter ID laws concludes the Constitution requires her to uphold them, the legal foundation for election integrity measures nationwide grows stronger.

Seven years of litigation. A preliminary injunction. An appeals court reversal. A state Supreme Court ruling. A 134-page federal decision. Every single step confirmed the same thing North Carolina voters already knew when they went to the polls and approved the amendment in the first place.

Showing an ID to vote is not Jim Crow. It is common sense. And now it is settled law in North Carolina.