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Thursday, December 20, 2007

Florida judge rules voter registration law unjustified

A federal judge in Florida granted an injunction on Tuesday to stop enforcement of the state's "no match, no vote" voter registration law. The law requires the name of a registrant be matched with a Social Security number or driver's license number.

The suit was filed by the Florida branch of the NAACP, the Haitian-American Grassroots Coalition, and the Southwest Voter Registration Education Project.

The plaintiffs asserted that more than 14,000 Floridians have been kept off the roles since the law took effect on January 1, 2006. The same matching requirement — which is extremely prone to error — was also stopped in Washington State by a federal judge in 2006.

U.S. District Judge Stephan Mickle ruled that the law "stands in direct conflict with accomplishing the full purposes and objectives of HAVA." HAVA — the Help America Vote Act — was passed by the U.S. Congress in 2002 in the wake of the 2000 election debacle.

To learn more check out…

• Judge's order
• Article by the Brennan Center for Justice "Federal Judge Blocks Florida Registration Law"
• News story in the Miami Herald