New: Georgia Sec. of State Hit With Another Lawsuit Over Voter Suppression

Another voter rights lawsuit is in motion in Georgia, this one explicitly targeting mail-in ballots.

On Tuesday, the Coalition for Good Governance filed suit against secretary of state, and gubernatorial candidate, Brian Kemp, as well as each member of the state’s Board of Elections and each member of Gwinnett County’s board of elections.

The group of five voters suing the state say that an unacceptable volume of mail ballots have been deemed invalid due to minuscule discrepancies, such as an incorrectly placed signature on the envelope. State voter registration reviews in Georgia are drawing widespread attention this election cycle. Around 53,000 people’s registration could be placed in limbo just weeks before the midterms due to the state’s “exact match” practice.

The Campaign Legal Center and Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law claim in a lawsuit aimed at Kemp’s office that Georgia’s “exact match” requirement violates not only the First and Fourteenth Amendments, but the Voter Rights Act, and the National Voter Registration Act. Currently, the state checks registration against official paperwork such as Social Security information, a driver’s license, or an address. Danielle Lang, senior legal counsel at the Campaign Legal Center, says it “too disproportionately and negatively impact[s] the ability of voting-eligible African-American, Latino and Asian-American applicants.” Lang says that while the use of “exact match” doesn’t violate a law, it is overly restrictive.

Read the full article