CASE STUDIES IN EMERGENCY ELECTION LITIGATION

Federal Judicial Center 8/23/2023 1

Mismatches Between Voter-Registration Data 

and Other Government Data 

Georgia Coalition for the Peoples’ Agenda v. Kemp 

(Eleanor L. Ross, N.D. Ga. 1:18-cv-4727) 

A federal complaint challenged a statute that required the name on 

a voter-registration form to exactly match—character and space 

and hyphen for character and space and hyphen—how the name 

appeared in other government records. The complaint also challenged the flagging of voter-registration applications as potentially 

from noncitizens just because the applicants had not yet become 

citizens when they received their driver’s licenses. One week after a 

motion for a preliminary injunction was filed and eleven days before a general election, the judge specified how voters could prove 

their citizenship and vote if their voter registrations had not become final because of citizenship questions. 

Subject: Registration procedures. Topics: Registration 

procedures; citizenship; signature matching; laches; provisional 

ballots; Help America Vote Act (HAVA). 

An October 11, 2018, federal complaint filed by six organizations in the 

Northern District of Georgia against Georgia’s secretary of state challenged 

an exact-match protocol for approving voter registrations, according to 

which registrations were set aside as pending if the name on the voter-registration form did not exactly match, character for character, the name on 

driver’s-license or social-security records.1 The complaint alleged that the 

protocol disproportionately affected African American, Latino, and Asian 

American applicants.2

 The complaint also alleged that citizenship status was 

falsely questioned for voter applicants who became citizens after they received driver’s licenses as noncitizens.3

The plaintiffs filed an amended complaint eight days later, which added 

two organizations as plaintiffs.4 With the amended complaint, the plaintiffs 

filed an emergency motion for a preliminary injunction protecting new voter 

registrations from “outdated, inaccurate [citizenship] information in the da1. Complaint, Ga. Coal. for the Peoples’ Agenda v. Kemp, No. 1:18-cv-4727 (N.D. Ga. 

Oct. 11, 2018), D.E. 1 [hereinafter Ga. Coal. for the Peoples’ Agenda Complaint]; see Mark 

Niesse, Lawsuit Challenges Ga.’s “Exact Match” Law, Atlanta J.-Const., Oct. 12, 2018, at 1A. 

2. Ga. Coal. for the Peoples’ Agenda Complaint, supra note 1, at 2. 

3. Id. at 3. 

“[I]f a person receives a Georgia driver’s license based on lawful status in the United 

States but is not yet a citizen, the [department of driver services] files will reflect that the 

person is not a citizen.” Ga. Coal. for the People’s Agenda v. Kemp, 347 F. Supp. 3d 1251, 

1260 (N.D. Ga. 2018). 

4. Amended Complaint, Ga. Coal. for the Peoples’ Agenda, No. 1:18-cv-4727 (N.D. Ga. 

Oct. 19, 2018), D.E. 15; Ga. Coal. for the People’s Agenda, 347 F. Supp. 3d at 1255; see Second 

Amended Complaint, Ga. Coal. for the Peoples’ Agenda, No. 1:18-cv-4727 (N.D. Ga. Dec. 20, 

2019), D.E. 57. 
Mismatches Between Voter-Registration Data and Other Government Data 

2 Federal Judicial Center 8/23/2023 

tabase used in the ‘exact match’ system.”5 That day, Judge Eleanor L. Ross set 

the case for hearing on October 29.6

Judge Ross ordered the secretary to respond, should he choose to, by October 24 at noon.7

 Two days later, the secretary requested an extension of two 

days to accommodate his responsibilities related to a hearing in two other 

cases to be heard on October 23.8

The Court is . . . cognizant of the two other pending cases against Defendant with hearings scheduled this week. Nevertheless, the Court chose the 

particular briefing and hearing schedule for this case based on the Court’s 

own trial calendar and availability of judicial resources that will be necessary to issue an order on Plaintiffs’ Emergency Motion prior to [election 

day on] November 6, 2018. Therefore, the Court DENIES Defendant’s Motion for an Extension of Time.9

An Earlier Case 

On September 14, 2016, three of the plaintiffs in the 2018 case filed a federal 

complaint in the Northern District against the secretary, challenging his exact match policy and alleging, “Insistence on digit-by-digit and character-bycharacter exactitude when comparing information from one database with 

information in a different database is a notoriously unreliable method of verification in the elections context.”10 That case was resolved by settlement in 

February 2017.11 The legislature restored the policy by statute.12

5. Emergency Preliminary-Injunction Motion, Ga. Coal. for the Peoples’ Agenda, No. 

1:18-cv-4727 (N.D. Ga. Oct. 19, 2018), D.E. 17; Ga. Coal. for the People’s Agenda, 347 F. 

Supp. 3d at 1255, 1258. 

6. Order, Ga. Coal. for the Peoples’ Agenda, No. 1:18-cv-4727 (N.D. Ga. Oct. 19, 2018), 

D.E. 19. 

7. Id. 

8. Extension Motion, id. (Oct. 21, 2018), D.E. 20; see Martin v. Crittenden, 347 F. Supp. 

3d 1302 (N.D. Ga. 2018) (October 24, 2018, injunction requiring election officials to regard 

mail ballots with apparently mismatched signatures as provisional and requiring them to 

provide voters with opportunities to resolve the discrepancies); Minutes, Ga. Muslim Voter 

Project v. Kemp, No. 1:18-cv-4789 (N.D. Ga. Oct. 23, 2018), D.E. 27; Minutes, Martin v. 

Kemp, No. 1:18-cv-4776 (N.D. Ga. Oct. 23, 2018), D.E. 22; see also Tyler Estep, Judge Mulls 

Action on Ga. Absentee Ballots, Atlanta J.-Const., Oct. 24, 2018, at 6A. 

9. Order, Ga. Coal. for the Peoples’ Agenda, No. 1:18-cv-4727 (N.D. Ga. Oct. 22, 2018), 

D.E. 21. 

10. Complaint at 2, Ga. State Conference of the NAACP v. Kemp, No. 2:16-cv-219 (N.D. 

Ga. Sept. 14, 2016), D.E. 1; see Kristina Torres, Suit: Ga. Blocks Minority Voters, Atlanta J.-

Const., Sept. 15, 2016, at 1A; Vanessa Williams, As Race in Georgia Narrows, Voting Rights 

Battles Heat Up, Wash. Post, Oct. 25, 2016, at A4. 

11. See Stipulation, Ga. State Conference of the NAACP, No. 2:16-cv-219 (N.D. Ga. Mar. 

28, 2017), D.E. 60; see also Jim Galloway, State’s Voter Security Fight Begins Anew Today, 

Atlanta J.-Const., Nov. 7, 2018, at 1B. 

“The state will no longer reject applications that don’t exactly match personal identification information in state and federal databases as part of the agreement, which was finalized 

late Thursday[, February 10, 2017].” Kristina Torres, Georgia Settles Voter Registration Lawsuit, Atlanta J.-Const., Feb. 11, 2017, at 1B. 

12. See Galloway, supra note 11. 
Mismatches Between Voter-Registration Data and Other Government Data 

Federal Judicial Center 8/23/2023 3

The 2018 Case 

Four days after the October 29, 2018, hearing,13 Judge Ross ordered that a 

voter applicant whose registration status was pending because of uncertainty 

about citizenship be able to vote either by providing proof of citizenship at 

the polling place, by providing the county registrar with proof of citizenship 

in advance, or by casting a provisional ballot and providing proof of citizenship within three days following the election.14

Judge Ross denied a laches defense: 

Plaintiffs . . . assert that they did not delay in bringing this action because this case is based on new facts that Plaintiffs have developed over 

time, including individual stories that were not necessarily indicative of a 

policy problem until Plaintiffs could gather sufficient data to identify a pattern. The Court finds this argument certainly plausible . . . . 

Additionally, the Court does not find that granting Plaintiffs injunctive 

relief this close to Election Day will cause undue prejudice to Defendant or 

the public, particularly where the relief sought by Plaintiffs is very limited 

and targeted.15

On September 29, 2022, Judge Ross denied the defendants summary 

judgment against a July 24, 2020, third amended complaint.16 She administratively closed the case on March 28, 2023, on telephonic representations by 

the parties of an effort to settle it.17

Further Litigation 

Judge Steve C. Jones conducted a bench trial from April 11 to June 23, 

2022,18 in a November 27, 2018, action generally challenging Georgia’s oversight of elections, including a challenge to the exact-match policy.19 He did 

13. Transcript, Ga. Coal. for the Peoples’ Agenda, No. 1:18-cv-4727 (N.D. Ga. Oct. 29, 

2018, filed Jan. 17, 2019), D.E. 38; Minutes, id. (Oct. 29, 2018), D.E. 30; Ga. Coal. for the 

People’s Agenda v. Kemp, 347 F. Supp. 3d 1251, 1255 (N.D. Ga. 2018) (p.3 of opinion filed 

at N.D. Ga. No. 1:18-cv-4727, D.E. 33). 

14. Ga. Coal. for the People’s Agenda, 347 F. Supp. 3d at 1269–70; see Amy Gardner, Fears 

for Ballot Integrity and Access Are Growing, Wash. Post, Nov. 5, 2018, at A1; Mark Niesse, 

Ruling Eases Voting for New Citizens, Atlanta J.-Const., Nov. 3, 2018, at 1A. 

15. Ga. Coal. for the People’s Agenda, 347 F. Supp. 3d at 1259. 

16. Opinion, Ga. Coal. for the Peoples’ Agenda, No. 1:18-cv-4727 (N.D. Ga. Sept. 29, 

2022), D.E. 160; see Third Amended Complaint, id. (July 24, 2020), D.E. 88. 

17. Order, id. (Mar. 28, 2023), D.E. 176; see Order, id. (Aug. 17, 2023), D.E. 183 (giving 

the parties until October 17 to decide whether to settle or pursue the case). 

18. Minutes, Fair Fight Action v. Crittenden, No. 1:18-cv-5391 (N.D. Ga. June 23, 2022), 

D.E. 852; Minutes, id. (Apr. 11, 2022), D.E. 789; Fair Fight Action, Inc. v. Raffensperger, 634 

F. Supp. 3d 1128, 1148 (N.D. Ga. 2022) (“[a]fter a delay in the start of trial due to the Omicron variant of COVID-19”); id. at 1143 (“what is believed to have been the longest voting 

rights bench trial in the history of the Northern District of Georgia”). 

19. Docket Sheet, Fair Fight Action, No. 1:18-cv-5391 (N.D. Ga. Nov. 27, 2018); Second 

Amended Complaint, id. (Dec. 3, 2020), D.E. 582; Amended Complaint, id. (Feb. 19, 2019), 

D.E. 41; Complaint at 39–41, id. (Nov. 27, 2018), D.E. 1; see Fair Fight Action v. Raffensperger, 413 F. Supp. 3d 1251 (N.D. Ga. 2019) (denying a motion to dismiss the amended complaint on standing, mootness, and other grounds, but dismissing the state election board 
Mismatches Between Voter-Registration Data and Other Government Data 

4 Federal Judicial Center 8/23/2023 

not find any flaws in the way that Georgia conducted elections requiring a 

judicial remedy.20

from some claims for sovereign immunity); Opinion, Fair Fight Action, No. 1:18-cv-5391 

(N.D. Ga. Nov. 15, 2021), D.E. 636 (denying the state summary judgment on whether requiring an exact match between names in voter registrations and other databases is racially 

discriminatory); Opinion, id. (Mar. 31, 2021), D.E. 617 (narrowing claims); Opinion, id.

(Feb. 16, 2021), D.E. 612 (narrowing claims, some as moot); Opinion, id. (Dec. 27, 2019), 

D.E. 188 (denying a preliminary injunction to restore voter registrations that were canceled 

for inactivity); see also Valerie Bauerlein, Suit Alleges Georgia Curbed Black Voters, Wall St. 

J., Nov. 28, 2018, at A4; Richard Fausset, Supporters of Candidate Who Lost Georgia Race 

Take the State to Court, N.Y. Times, Nov. 28, 2018, at A19; Vanessa Williams, Lawsuit by 

Abrams’s PAC Alleges Voter Suppression in Georgia, Wash. Post, Nov. 30, 2018, at A4. 

20. Fair Fight Action, Inc., 634 F. Supp. 3d 1128; see Matthew Brown, Judge Upholds Ga. 

Law in Challenge Brought by Abrams After 2018 Loss, Wash. Post, Oct. 2, 2022, at A8.