South Carolina Progressive Network Education Fund v. Andino

In South Carolina, voters must submit their registrations by 30 days before the election—October 4, 2020. Because many county, in-person facilities are closed on weekends, some voters have to register in-person by Friday, October 2, 2020. The cut off for internet-based registrations is October 4 and mailed registrations must be postmarked by October 5.  This year, organizations that register citizens to vote were effectively prevented from registering voters from March 30, 2020, when South Carolina imposed a state of emergency and other restrictions on day-to-day interactions in order to mitigate the effects of the pandemic. As a result, new voter registration is far lower than in previous years.

Free Speech For People represented the South Carolina Progressive Network Education Fund, in this challenge in federal district court in South Carolina, alleging First and Fourteenth Amendment violations as applied. The organization had to divert and spend additional money, time, and other resources it would not otherwise have spent to register voters ahead of the voter registration cutoff because defendant has not extended the voter registration cutoff. The plaintiff has successfully pivoted its operations to adapt to the pandemic, successfully registering thousands of South Carolina voters.

Yet South Carolina’s voter registration deadline—earlier than most states, threatened to prematurely halt those efforts. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, South Carolina is one of only six states that close voter registration 30 days in advance of elections. The complaint, filed on Oct. 2, pointed out that the current 30 day ban on voter registration prior to an election became law in the 1895 State Constitution that was written to exclude Black citizens from voting.

The Executive Director of the South Carolina State Election Commission’s enforcement of the voter registration cutoff under these conditions has frustrated the plaintiffs’ fundamental mission of registering as many voters as possible. We sought a court order extending the October 4 voter registration cutoff to at least October 19, 2020.  Unfortunately, on October 9, the court denied our motion for preliminary relief, effectively ending the case.

We were pleased to partner with the law firms of Emery Celli Brinckerhoff Abady Ward & Maazel LLP and Burnette Shutt McDaniel P.A. in this litigation.