A court has thrown the ball back to the Virgin Islands Legislature after a hotly contested special election. A recent article with the breaking news was on Ballot Access News by Richard Winger titled, “Third Circuit Rules on Disputed Virgin Islands Legislative Election”. Here is an excerpt:

On June 9, the Third Circuit issued this opinion in Rodriquez v 32nd Legislature of the Virgin Islands, 17-1518. It says that no court can decide whether Kevin Rodriquez meets the qualifications to be in the legislature. Only the legislature itself can decide that. The federal law that functions as the Constitution of the U.S. Virgin Islands has a three-year residency requirement for members of the legislature. After Rodriquez was elected in November 2016, he was not seated, because it was discovered that he had sworn (during a bankruptcy proceeding) that he had been a resident of Tennessee for the past few years.

The Virgin Islands had then held a special election to fill his seat on April 8, 2017, which was won by an independent candidate, Janelle Sarauw. However because the dispute was unresolved, the Virgin Islands election authorities refused to certify the results. Lawsuits had been filed in both the Virgin Islands court system and the federal court system, but their only result has been to tell the legislature to make its own determination as to whether Rodriquez satisfies the residency requirement.

According to the Virgin Islands website, the “present Legislature of the Virgin Islands is a fifteen member body in which all the legislative powers of the territory are vested. It enjoys the powers and privileges held by most state legislatures of the Union. The Capitol Building, in which the body is housed,is located just south of Fort Christian on the Island of St. Thomas.”

In 1916 and 1917, Denmark and the U.S., respectively, ratified a treaty in which Denmark sold the Danish West Indies to the United States of America for $25 million in gold. The Virgin Islands are classified at the United Nations as so-called Non-Self-Governing Territory. But are currently considered inside the United States as an organized, unincorporated United States territory.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit serves Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, and the Virgin Islands. From the Third Circuit:

Kevin Rodriquez was elected to serve in the Virgin Islands Legislature. After his election, Janelle K. Sarauw and Brigitte Berry filed a lawsuit in the Virgin Islands Superior Court against Rodriquez, the Virgin Islands Joint Board of Elections, the Board of Elections of St. Thomas and St. John, and Caroline F. Fawkes (the “Board of Elections Defendants”) challenging Rodriquez’s qualifications to serve as a member of the Legislature (the “Removed Action”).

Rodriquez removed that suit to federal court and filed his own action against the 32nd Legislature of the Virgin Islands and its president, Myron Jackson, essentially asking the District Court to rule that only the Legislature can decide who is qualified to serve in the Legislature (the “Federal Action”).

Because a judicial determination about whether Rodriquez is qualified to serve as a member of the Virgin Islands 32nd Legislature would infringe on the separation of powers between the Virgin Islands legislative and judicial branches, the Federal Action is no longer justiciable.

As to the Removed Action, Rodriquez does not having standing to appeal the District Court’s order because he was a prevailing party, and we have no meaningful relief to grant him. We will therefore affirm the District Court’s dismissal of the Federal Action and dismiss Rodriquez’s appeal of the Removed Action.