The bill was drafted (at least in part) in reaction to the controversy surrounding the 2000 U.S. presidential election, when the Supreme Court narrowly ruled that Bush was the president.

The necessity for this ruling stemmed from controversies surrounding the validity of the election and whether votes were cast in a fair and equitable manner.

[4] To be eligible for federal funding, states must submit a plan describing how payments will be used and distributed, provisions for voter education and poll worker training, how to adopt voting system guidelines, performance measures to determine success (including goals, timetables, responsibilities, and criteria), administrative complaint procedures, and the committee who helped develop the state plan.

The Secretary of Health and Human Services is authorized to make payments to state and local governments for making polling places‒including path of travel, entrances, exits, and voting areas‒accessible to individuals with disabilities, including the blind and visually impaired, in a manner that provides the same opportunity for access and participation (including privacy and independence) as for other voters; and providing individuals with disabilities and others with information about the accessibility of polling places, including outreach programs to inform the individuals about the availability of accessible polling places and training election officials, poll workers, and election volunteers on how best to promote the access and participation of individuals with disabilities in elections for Federal office.

HAVA created the Election Assistance Commission (EAC), an independent agency of the United States government.

Not later than January 31 of each year, the EAC is required to submit an annual report to Congress detailing activities related to HAVA programs including grants or other payments and all votes taken by commissioners.

Concerns were raised that as late as 2005, vendors were selling non-compliant machines to unwitting states and counties who believed that they were HAVA-compliant.

Unless vendors offered a specific guarantee of HAVA compliance, equipment may have required scrapping or retrofitting at taxpayers' expense after January 1, 2006.

The legislative director of the League of Women Voters of the United States, Lloyd J. Leonard, expressed doubts about the bill.

[19] A Pennsylvania court ruled in April 2007 that voting machine certification was the result of what Judge Rochelle Friedman called "deficient examination criteria" which "do not approximate those that are customary in the information technology industry for systems that require a high level of security".

The legislated offers some alternatives to photo ID such as utility bill or government assistance letter, but the ACLU says some classes of persons, like battered women, may not have access to these documents.

In the end, ID requirements were included as a part of the bill after a compromise was made and it was accepted in the Senate by a vote of 99-1.

Critics contend that it costs the country millions of dollars just to process the same basic registration form and confirm that they meet the HAVA requirements.