Public Rights Project (PRP) filed a friend-of-the court (amicus) brief on behalf of a coalition of Michigan election clerks urging the state Supreme Court to uphold guidance on managing election challengers in O’Halloran v. Benson. The guidance seeks to empower local election officials to maintain order and to protect the right to vote, especially in the face of concern that election deniers will abuse the process to slow down voting on Election Day. As argued in the brief, the manual does not alter the rights or opportunities of legitimate challengers to raise questions about voter registration when they are acting in good faith and relying on factual information.
Signatories include clerks in Ingham County, Delta Township, Genesee County, Romulus City, Washtenaw County, City of Westland, Canton Township, and Lansing City.
Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson issued the guidance in 2022 to address growing concerns about the misuse of the election challenger process to intimidate voters, disenfranchise voters through undue delay, cause chaos and confusion in polling places and counting centers, and unfairly call the integrity of elections into question without basis. The Secretary’s guidance includes straightforward updates intended to empower local election officials to guard against such subversion. As argued by PRP’s coalition of clerks, the challenged provisions of the guidance align with Michigan law and fall squarely within the Secretary’s authority.
Challengers play an important role in promoting confidence in the integrity of our elections, but their role is intended to be modest. Challenges can only be mounted with specific information about an individual’s eligibility to vote. The bases for these challenges are narrow. However, there are groups in Michigan seeking to misuse the challenge process by challenging hundreds of voters at a time. Several clerks received challenges relating to large numbers of voters in advance of the primary and general elections in 2022. The Secretary’s guidance helps clerks deal with these issues and more.
