Campaign Legal Center Challenges Florida’s Plan to Purge Voters

Date

On August 22, 2012, the Campaign Legal Center submitted an amended complaint to a federal court in Florida to address recent developments in the Secretary of State’s (“SOS”) ongoing efforts to remove thousands of registered voters from the state’s voter rolls before the general election in November, 2012. The Legal Center’s attorneys are part of the legal team representing a wide array of groups and individuals who have brought this legal challenge. The case isArcia v. Detzner, No. 12-22282 (S.D. Fl.)

This case was originally brought in June 2012 to challenge a program initiated by the Florida Secretary of State (SOS) to identify non-citizens who are currently on Florida’s voter rolls. The suit alleged that the Secretary’s actions violated the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA), along with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.   The Florida Secretary of State abandoned the program due to numerous errors and flaws in the list of voters identified by the Secretary of State. However, some Florida County Supervisors of Elections did utilize the flawed list produced by the Florida SOS and notified voters that they had been identified as non-citizens. Many persons on the list were citizens however, and the Florida SOS never took any steps to reinstate or reassure the legally registered voters who had been mistakenly identified as non-citizens. Instead, the SOS has sought access to the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements Database (SAVE) to cross-check his list of potential non-citizens and to continue and complete his planned systematic purge. Because the planned purge will violate both the NVRA and Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, Plaintiffs filed a motion to file their amended complaint.

To read the amended complaint, click here.