The powerful Democrat law firm that bankrolled the Steele dossier is now defending a Virginia candidate accused of running in a district where she doesn’t reside.

by Jacob Grandstaff

Once again, the Elias Law Group has arrived to defend an embattled Democrat, this time in Stafford County, Virginia. The firm, founded by Marc Elias—the same political operative who bankrolled the now-infamous Steele dossier against President Donald Trump—has made a career of jumping into state election cases whenever Democrats’ electoral interests are threatened.

This week, Elias’s firm came to the defense of Stacey Carroll, the Democrat nominee for Virginia’s 64th House District, who faces allegations that she doesn’t actually live in the district she’s seeking to represent.

The lawsuit to remove her from the voter rolls—and thus from the ballot—was filed by three local voters, who have gathered evidence that Carroll registered at an address in the district while residing outside of it—a clear violation of the Virginia Constitution’s residency requirement.

Carroll’s lawyers at Elias Law Group have filed a motion to dismiss on three grounds.

They claim the legal legal code on which the petitioners are basing their case specifically refutes their ability to do so because it’s based solely on Carroll’s purported change of residence.

They contend that only the Virginia House of Delegates can decide if a candidate is qualified to hold office after the election.

They also claim the plaintiffs waited too long to legally file.

It’s a familiar pattern for the firm. The same operation that’s filed lawsuits to overturn congressional maps claiming “voter suppression” when Republicans win too many seats now insists that a Virginia court can’t question whether a Democrat candidate lives where she claims.

Petitioners push back: “This case must be heard”

The petitioners’ response to the Elias Law Group’s motion to dismiss doesn’t mince words. It argues that Carroll’s defense “misconstrues and misapprehends” both the law and the challenge, and that Virginia’s courts absolutely have the authority to determine whether a candidate is lawfully registered to vote.

The law is clear. Virginia’s § 24.2-431 explicitly allows “any three qualified voters [to] file with the circuit court of the county or city in which they are registered, a petition stating their objections to the registration of any person whose name is on the registration records for their county or city.”

The Elias Law Group focuses on the next section of that code, which reads: “However, no petition may be filed if the only objection raised is based on removal of residence from the precinct.” But as the petitioners’ lawyer notes, the petitioners’ objection is not that Carroll is running for office in another precinct—it’s that she’s running for office in an entirely different district from the one she actually lives in.

To the objection that only the House can decide this issue after the election, the response reads: “This is a pre-election challenge to where Delegate Candidate Carroll actually resides” and “has nothing to do with the House of Delegate’s post-election prerogative to determine the qualifications of its members.”

In other words, the House of Delegates decides who can stay in office—but the courts decide who can appear on the ballot in the first place.

The petitioners’ argument rests on the Virginia Constitution’s straightforward requirement that to run for the House of Delegates, a candidate for Delegate must be able to vote for the office he or she seeks to represent. The state code defines “residence” as both domicile—intent to remain—and place of abode—where one actually lives. Petitioners have evidence that Carroll has failed both tests.

The response also dismantles Elias Law Group’s argument that petitioners waited too long to challenge Carroll’s residency.

Petitioners gave Carroll and the Democratic Party of Virginia formal notice on August 29, well before the September 5 deadline to replace her on the ballot. If anyone is responsible for the timing crunch, their lawyer notes, it’s Carroll for refusing to withdraw.

This is not just a fight over an address. It’s a fight over the integrity of representation. The plaintiffs argue correctly that every Virginian has the right to be represented by someone who actually lives in their district—not someone parachuted in by party strategists and defended by a Beltway law firm famous for bending election law to partisan advantage.

The Elias Law Group may specialize in turning local election disputes into national battles, but the petitioners’ message is simple—the rule of law still matter. Voters deserve to know that their representative actually lives there. As the petitioner’s lawyer’s response to the Elias Law Group plainly shows, the law is on their side.

Jacob Grandstaff is an Investigative Researcher for Restoration News specializing in election integrity and labor policy. This article has been republished with permission from Restoration News.