Montana Voter Registration Penalty Law is Permanently Blocked
Pro-voting groups reached an agreement with Montana’s secretary of state and attorney general to permanently block portions of a Republican-backed law that criminalizes voters who are inadvertently registered to vote elsewhere.
The agreement, which was approved by a district court judge on Monday, comes after more than a year of litigation challenging provisions of House Bill 892, which was signed into law by Gov. Greg Gianforte (R) in May 2023. The bill’s backers said it was intended to block voters who register to vote in Montana from deliberately remaining registered to vote in another jurisdiction.
But the law imposed criminal penalties and fines even on people who violated the provision inadvertently. The pro-voting groups who sued to block the law — the Montana Public Interest Research Group and the Montana Federation of Public Employees — alleged that it’s overly vague in its language, which could be used to unjustly punish voters for making a mistake. The lawsuit also challenged a provision of HB 892 that requires a person who was previously registered to vote in another county or state to provide their previous registration information when they’re registering to vote. The plaintiffs alleged that this requirement could lead to voters being criminalized for simply forgetting to fill out a portion of their voter registration. Specifically, the plaintiffs argued that these parts of H.B. 892 violate the U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of due process and burden the right to vote under the First and 14th Amendments.
“HB892’s reach far exceeds its stated (and legitimate) purpose of prohibiting double voting,” the plaintiffs wrote in their original lawsuit. “It criminalizes both the act of maintaining multiple voter registrations and the failure to include prior-registration information on applications, even if voters and registrants have no intention of actually voting in more than one place — and even if they never do.”
In April 2024, the law was temporarily blocked when the district court judge granted the plaintiffs a preliminary injunction. “The public maintains a strong interest in ‘exercising the fundamental political right to vote,’ the judge wrote in the order. “The ability of Montana voters to register to vote without fear of felony criminal penalties appears to substantially implicate the public’s interest in protecting the franchise.”
The order was appealed by the Republican intervenors in the case — the Republican National Committee and the Montana Republican Party — to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, who upheld the district court’s ruling.
With both parties reaching an agreement, Montana won’t enforce the challenged provision of HB 892. And under the district court’s order, the state is permanently prohibited from imposing criminal penalties on anyone who forgets to cancel their registration in other counties or a different state or fails to provide their previous registration information while registering to vote.
Note: The plaintiffs in this case are represented by the Elias Law Group (ELG). ELG Firm Chair Marc Elias is the Founder of Democracy Docket.