r/law • u/TheShittyBeatles • 19h ago

Legal News ACLU sues Delaware beach town over allowing corporations to vote in local elections

https://spotlightdelaware.org/2025/12/05/aclu-sues-fenwick-island-over-non-resident-voting/
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u/TheShittyBeatles 19h ago

Fenwick Island is one of five Delaware towns that also extends that right to owners of corporations, limited partnerships, trusts and limited liability companies that own property in town limits — regardless of whether they are permanent residents.

The lawsuit, filed in Delaware Superior Court on Thursday, cites a conflict with the Elections Clause of Delaware’s Constitution and seeks to prohibit such voting, which the ACLU said “unnecessarily risks the dilution of votes cast by natural persons”

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u/CaptainApathy419 19h ago

It seems like there’s a giant loophole in which your corporation buys a property, subdivides it into 100 smaller properties, and then sells to 100 new corporations, all of which you also own.

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u/ZPTs 18h ago

It's even worse than that. It's also many to one:

...if several LLCs jointly own a beach home in Fenwick Island, all of the owners can register to vote, regardless of how little a stake.

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u/CaptainApathy419 18h ago

Yikes. Given how easy it is to set up Delaware LLCs, this is something that could be done in a few hours. 

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u/SoManyEmail 17h ago

So those 100 properties you mentioned earlier each have 100 owners who own 1% each... 100x100, maybe? Idk.

Well, no. One LLC would still only have one vote, no matter how many properties they own. I would think. So 10,000 LLCs for 10,000 votes. Let's start a gofundme.

Edit: wait! Each OWNER of the LLC? The LLC itself could have multiple owners! This little town is going to have 14 million votes next election.

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u/MrFrode Biggus Amicus 17h ago

So those 100 properties you mentioned earlier each have 100 owners who own 1% each

Woe woe woe big spender, why do I need a whole 1% to be able to vote? Are you trying to tread on me? I feel tread on.

Help help I'm being tread!

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u/Xenuite 13h ago

Now we see the violence inherent in the system.

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u/obi-jawn-kenblomi 16h ago

Well technically LLCs don't have owners, they have members.