On April 3, the 11th circuit voted 2-1 to let Florida continue to use a restrictive voter registration law that was passed in 2005. The decision does not say that the Florida law is legal or constitutional, but it says that while the issue of the law’s legality and constitutionality is being adjudicated in court, the law may remain in effect. The U.S. District Court had enjoined the law back on December 18, 2007.

The law says that voters registering to vote must provide the last four digits of their Social Security Number, or their Florida Drivers License number. The voter registrations are not processed unless there is an exact match between the name and address listed on the form, and the name and address on the Social Security rolls or the Drivers License records. If there is no exact match, the voter is sent a notice saying that his or her voter registration application has been rejected. The voter registration application in Florida is 29 days before an election. If the voter registration application is rejected, and it is now too late for the same voter to try to re-register, the voter may only vote provisionally. The provisional vote will not be counted unless the voter returns to the county elections office within two days of the election and demonstrates that the initial rejection of the voter registration application was due to a government error. If the rejection was caused by the voter’s own careless or inadvertent error (such as listing a slightly different form of name, for example a missing hyphen, or forgetting to add “Junior”, or transposing a digit in a Social Security number or a drivers license number) then the provisional vote is not counted.

The Florida restriction had caused 14,000 voter registration applications to be rejected during 2006 and 2007. No other state has a law like this.

The majority decision in the 11th circuit does not discuss the constitutionality of the Florida voter registration law, but the dissent does. The decision was written by Judge Gerald Tjoflat, who has been on the 11th circuit since 1975. Judge Tjoflat has written or signed more unfavorable ballot access decisions than any other U.S. Court of Appeals Judge in history.