Elections: voter registration.

Existing law requires that a person, in order to be eligible to vote, be registered to vote by an affidavit of registration, and further specifies the contents of an affidavit of registration and the means by which it may be executed. In addition, the Uniform Electronic Transactions Act establishes specified requirements that apply to a transaction, as defined, that the parties to the transaction have agreed to conduct by electronic means. Existing law also specifies certain criteria that must be satisfied in order for a digital signature to be used in place of a manual signature in a written communication with a public entity. This bill would provide that an affidavit of registration constitutes both a transaction within the meaning of the Uniform Electronic Transactions Act and a written communication with a public entity. The bill would further provide that a county elections official may accept an affidavit of registration electronically if the affidavit complies with the Uniform Electronic Transactions Act, if the signature on the affidavit complies with the requirements imposed by existing law on a digital signature used for a written communication with a public entity, and if the signature on the affidavit is recorded using a technology that allows the county elections official to visually compare the signature to other signatures of the affiant. This bill would make the foregoing changes both in provisions of law that are currently operative and in provisions of law that may replace those operative provisions in the event of a specified contingency.