Amir Ali
Judge of the US District Court for the District of Columbia.
On 28 September 2026 Judge Amir Ali vacated the voting requirements FEMA had bolted onto its anti-terrorism grants, holding that Washington could not withhold a fifth of a state's award to force use of the SAVE citizenship database.
Last refreshed: 1 October 2026 · Appears in 1 active topic
Timeline for Amir Ali
Vacated FEMA's election conditions
US Midterms 2026: Judge Ali voids FEMA election conditionsBackground
Amir Ali is a judge of the US District Court for the District of Columbia, nominated by President Joe Biden and confirmed by the Senate in November 2024. Born in Canada, he trained as an engineer before studying law at Harvard. Before the bench he spent years at the MacArthur Justice Center, a civil-rights litigation group, first as its Supreme Court and appellate counsel and later as its president and executive director.
His most consequential election ruling came on 28 September 2026 in a challenge brought by Nashville's metropolitan government. Under FEMA's terms, a state that declined to run SAVE searches, to count one paper ballot in twenty by hand or to phase out its voting machines would forfeit a fifth of its counterterrorism award. Ali vacated those conditions.
The decision drew a line that the Supreme Court's SAVE stay three days earlier had not: states may use the federal database, but the government cannot make grant money depend on it. That distinction between permitting a tool and compelling it is the core of his ruling.
What did Judge Amir Ali rule about FEMA's election conditions?
Who is Judge Amir Ali?
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