The American Civil Liberties Union of New Hampshire, three voting rights organizations and five current and future voters sued the state over what they say places a burden on Granite Staters’ right to vote.

They’re challenging a bill signed by Gov. Chris Sununu last month that eliminates voter affidavits, meaning people who try to register to vote at the polls without a photo ID will be turned away. First-time New Hampshire voters will also be required to file proof of U.S. citizenship. The law goes into effect after the Nov. 5 election.

Court documents say HB 1569 violates the U.S. Constitution’s First and 14th Amendments. ACLU-NH alleges it’ll be one of the most restrictive voter registration laws in the country and add an unnecessary burden on the right to vote.

“Voting is the cornerstone of our democracy – and laws like this, which create unconstitutional roadblocks to voting and which could stop thousands of eligible voters from participating in an election, have no place in our state,” Henry Klementowicz, the ACLU-NH’s deputy legal director, said in a press release.

The League of Women Voters of New Hampshire, Coalition for Open Democracy and The Forward Foundation filed the joint lawsuit yesterday with ACLU-NH and Ropes & Gray LLP, a global firm that has a branch in Boston. Secretary of State David Scanlan and Attorney General John Formella are named as the defendants.

“We will review the complaint and respond as appropriate,” a spokesperson for Formella said in a statement. Scanlan’s office declined to comment on this story.

Over 950 people voted in New Hampshire by affidavit in the 2020 presidential election, according to the lawsuit. Affidavits allow people to register and vote without documentation, then confirm their age, citizenship or identity with the Secretary of State’s office after the election.

Some advocacy groups had sounded an alarm on the bill before Sununu signed it into law, saying it’d enact unnecessary barriers and disproportionately affect certain groups like college students, first-time voters, housing-insecure voters and people who’ve changed their names.

The individual plaintiffs include a woman who is taking her husband’s last name after getting married this year; a Littleton resident who’s been unhoused for a year and has no physical address; and three teenagers who plan to register to vote for the first time in the next two years. The lawsuit alleges that HB 1569 would infringe on their rights by placing a burden on those who have yet to change their identification to reflect new names or addresses and on those who don’t have immediate access to their birth certificate or passport.

Supporters of the law – like Bob Lynn, a Republican state representative from Windham who sponsored it in the legislature – say it creates a reasonable expectation of responsibility and preparedness among voters. 

“If you want to vote, you have to take some responsibility,” Lynn told the Monitor in July. “You have to find out what the requirements are to vote and make a plan, so to speak, to make sure that you comply with those requirements.”

Charlotte Matherly is the statehouse reporter for the Concord Monitor and Monadnock Ledger-Transcript in partnership with Report for America. Follow her on X at @charmatherly, or send her an email at cmatherly@cmonitor.com.