Nonprofit organizations have taken an active role in voter protection efforts this election season, leading the way with voter registration initiatives, fighting unlawful voter purges, protecting student voting rights, and fighting voter ID requirements, among other activities. Many nonprofits are working to ensure that all eligible individuals who desire to register to vote are able to do so. The Nonprofit Voter Engagement Network has an array of resources on its website to assist nonprofits in various voter engagement activities, such as information on conducting voter registration drives, toolkits, voter guides, and voter links and hotlines.

The Lawyer's Committee for Civil Rights is operating an extensive voter protection program. As part of the program, the group has launched an election protection hotline, website, and legal field program. The hotline and website serve as a resource to answer voter questions, to assist voters in locating polling places, and to report any Election Day problems. The legal field program trains volunteer attorneys, law students, and paralegals to staff election protection hotlines and serve as mobile legal volunteers at polling places around the nation. The organization is also helping to recruit poll workers and monitoring efforts to disenfranchise voters.

Voter purging has been a big issue this election cycle. There have been efforts across the nation to illegally purge voters from the voter rolls. The Brennan Center for Justice recently released a publication titled Voter Purges that gives a synopsis of voter purging issues around the nation and offers policy recommendations on how to address these issues. In one such effort, the United States Student Association Foundation, the American Civil Liberties Union Fund of Michigan, and the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan filed suit on Sept. 17 against the Michigan Secretary of State, the Michigan Director of Elections, and the City Clerk for the City of Ypsilanti to prevent the state from implementing two voter removal programs. As a result of the suit, a federal judge ordered the state of Michigan to halt one of two methods used to purge voters and to restore 1,438 names to the voter rolls.

In Florida, the "No-Match, No-Vote" law requires that a person's drivers license number or Social Security number be verified before they are registered to vote. The Florida NAACP and various local groups filed suit to prevent the state from enforcing the law. The law was upheld and the state began enforcing it in September. Additionally, the Campaign Legal Center, along with other nonprofit organizations, is seeking to enter a case to prevent the state of Wisconsin from purging voter rolls.

Voter ID requirements have the potential to disenfranchise many eligible voters. Some states have instituted voter ID requirements to prevent voter fraud, even though numerous studies suggest that there is not a widespread voter fraud problem. According to the Brennan Center for Justice, up to 12 percent of eligible voters do not have a government-issued ID. "[T]he percentage is even higher for seniors, people of color, people with disabilities, low-income voters, and students." Several nonprofits, including the ACLU, the Brennan Center, AARP, and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, filed amicus briefs in Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, a case challenging Indiana's voter ID law, which is the most restrictive voter ID law in the nation.

In Alabama, nonprofits are working to ensure that eligible ex-offenders are able to register to vote. Alabama law prohibits individuals convicted of felonies of "moral turpitude" from voting unless their rights are restored. According to the Birmingham News, the Alabama Attorney General has named approximately 70 crimes "that have by statute or appellate decision been defined as crimes of moral turpitude," but the state has been using a list of more than 400 crimes to disqualify individuals from voting. The NAACP Legal Defense Fund filed a lawsuit to allow Reverend Kenneth Glasgow to resume registering eligible voters who are incarcerated in Alabama prisons.

Nonprofits are also working to ensure that students are not disenfranchised. The Student Association for Voter Empowerment (SAVE), which was founded and is run by students, has been bringing attention to issues that affect student voters. The group held a press conference last month where political leaders affirmed their commitment to ensure that student voter rights are protected. Rock the Vote has been very instrumental in encouraging young people to vote and holding voter registration drives on college campuses. The Brennan Center for Justice has produced a student voting guide. According to the Brennan Center, the guide "explains the basic residency, registration, identification, and absentee voting requirements for student voters in each of the 50 states and the D.C."