NAACP: Stop striking voters from rolls in North Carolina

RALEIGH, NC (AP) – The NAACP is asking a federal court to stop several county boards of election in North Carolina from removing people from the voter rolls through challenges filed by individuals.

The lawsuit filed Monday names the State Board of Elections and county boards in Moore and Beaufort counties, where thousands of voters’ names have been challenged.

“The Tar Heel state is ground zero in the intentional, surgical efforts by Republicans to suppress the voice of voters,” said William Barber II, President of the North Carolina NAACP. “The NAACP is defending rights of all North Carolinians to participate in this election. We’re taking this emergency step to make sure not a single voters’ voice is unlawfully taken away. This is our Selma and we will not back down and allow this suppression to continue.”

The National Voter Registration Act prohibits boards of election from clearing voter names from the rolls within 90 days of a federal election. But state law doesn’t place the same restraint on individual challenges.

The director of the State Board of Elections says the federal law hasn’t been interpreted to ban individual challenges.

The lawsuit also seeks to restore the names of voters who have already been removed.

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