Second suit filed against Blackwell

TOLEDO (AP) -- Democrats have filed a second lawsuit against Ohio's top elections official, accusing him of trying to use voting rights laws to disenfranchise voters.
The Lucas County Democratic Party and the Ohio Democratic Party filed the lawsuit on Friday against Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell, a Republican.
The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Toledo, said Blackwell told county boards of elections not to process voter registration forms if the applicants had not filled out a space on the form for their driver's license numbers or the last four digits of their Social Security numbers.
An exception would be applicants who say they do not have that information and write "none" in the space.
Mail registrations without the information would be accepted but flagged so voters would have to produce proof of identity at the polling place, according to Blackwell's memo, dated Dec. 31, 2003.
The Democrats said denying in-person registrations missing the information would violate the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 and that the information "is not compelled in Ohio at this time" by the Help America Vote Act, which Congress passed in 2002.
The latter act specifies that if an applicant does not have a driver's license or Social Security number, the applicant may not register unless the state issues the applicant a special number for registration purposes. The state is required to issue such a number.
A mail-in registrant who does not provide the information must bring an identification card, bank statement, utility bill or other form of identification to the polling place, HAVA says.
Blackwell's office had not seen the lawsuit and could not comment, spokesman Carlo LoParo said Saturday.
On Thursday, a federal judge in Toledo overruled a Blackwell directive that would have prevented local boards from accepting provisional ballots cast by people who come to the wrong polling place. Blackwell is appealing the judge's ruling, citing requirements of HAVA.