Blog
Allegations of Voter Fraud
By Keesha Gaskins – 12/12/11
Last week, New Mexico Secretary of State Diana Duran released a November 16, 2011 “interim progress report” summarizing previous findings by her office raising issues with New Mexico’s voter registration database. Like her earlier testimony last March, in which she refused to release the underlying data for her claims, this interim report by Secretary Duran is vague on details and methodology, and it lacks citations. As a result, confirming or investigating the claims and conclusions of the report is nearly impossible. But based upon the findings of the interim report, problems with New Mexico’s voter registration systems appear to be a result of how the Secretary of State manages the voter registration lists and identifies errors. The report doesn’t demonstrate any clear evidence of intent to commit fraud.
In March 2011, Duran appeared at a hearing on “no-photo, no-vote” voter ID legislation claiming, among other things, that her office matched 117 voter registrations to people who had used foreign-national credentials to obtain driver’s licenses. In the newly-released interim report, Secretary Duran focused on the 117 people that her office found on both lists. The report identifies 85 individuals without any voting history and 13 individuals that lacked sufficient identifying information for her office to determine whether they were the same person that appeared on both lists. That leaves 19 people with the same name who appeared on both lists and who voted at some point following their registration.
Of the 19 voters who appeared on both the voter registration list and the foreign-national credentialed driver’s license list, Secretary Duran’s office identified nine people who voted prior to applying for a driver’s license using foreign national documentation. Secretary Duran does not, however, provide information on how she matched those nine persons between the lists. Given a large enough pool, a matching name and birthdate are not enough to ensure that it is the same person on both lists – at least not without using unique identifying numbers on both lists, which she did not do. Moreover, even an address check cannot avoid problems with duplication of name, missing suffixes or prefixes, or even errors in the pollbooks. For the remaining 10 voters who Secretary Duran identified as registered to vote and who voted sometime after obtaining a driver’s license with foreign-national credentials, it is important to note that in the initial review of the voter file, Secretary Duran compared voting records between 2003 and 2010. During that same period 13,205 New Mexico residents became U.S. citizens.The potential for overlap here is not accounted for in her allegations.
From the analysis the Secretary of State has presented, there have been a number of problems at the different levels of administration that handle voter registration forms. One of the complaints from the Secretary is the use of “dummy” social security numbers, as their system will not accept an application without a social security number and so some officials used other numbers and added zeros to override that feature. Correcting this problem would be a clear first step towards preventing further confusion in the state’s voting rolls. The Secretary blames provisions of the NVRA for encouraging non-citizens to register to vote by offering them a registration form at the DMV and when applying for public benefits. Both requirements have proven to be highly successful measures that have increased access to voter registration among eligible American citizens. If New Mexico can devise and follow more effective protocols for registering new voters, then people registering who are not eligible will not be an issue.
There are many ways that the processing of voter registrations can be improved, including modernizing voter registration to limit clerical and data errors that are common and allowing more shared information between state and election offices. By allowing less opportunity for administrative error, making voter registration rules and procedures clearer, implementing safeguards, and properly adding voters to the voter file, the types of problems identified by Secretary Duran’s interim report will be minimized. Secretary Duran has self-identified a number of areas where her office can help tighten up procedures, make forms and signage more clear for citizens and non-citizens alike, and eliminate problems with list maintenance. The practice of holding up unrelated allegations of voter fraud, vilifying non-citizens, and creating unnecessary work for law enforcement is not responsible policy-making – it’s rabble-rousing and it’s bad governance.
Secretary Duran has clearly identified multiple areas where her office can implement new policies, procedures and practices that would vastly improve the administration of New Mexico’s elections without imposing any new, unnecessary burdens on voters.
Tags: Democracy, Voting Rights & Elections, Allegations of Voter Fraud, Other Voter List Issues
By Lee Rowland – 10/18/11
Sometimes political operatives go too far. Opponents of Maine’s long-standing and popular same-day voter registration system killed it in the legislature this year – but they still have to face an unhappy public at the polls. Sadly, their main campaign tactic appears to be producing lists that smear the good names of Maine residents, and the integrity of the state’s elections, with unfounded insinuations of election crimes.
First there was the list of 206: 206 students living at the University of Maine, who had come to identify Maine as their new home, but paid out-of-state tuition under the University’s strict rules. Suddenly a politician holds a press conference, and their hometowns, initials, and birth dates appear on a blacklist of students that “may have committed voter fraud.” The secretary of state then folded this list into a serious criminal investigation, which proceeded in spite of the easily-discovered fact that the sole criterion used to compile it – that the 206 paid out-of-state tuition – has nothing to do with their eligibility to vote in Maine.
The secretary recently confirmed that his investigation of the list revealed no evidence of fraud, but inexplicably, even as he affirmed that students have every legal right to vote where they live, he questioned their patriotism for doing so. The ACLU of Maine and allied organizations wrote Maine Secretary of State Charles Summers today, demanding he send a new letter clarifying these voters’ rights and correcting the record.
Then came the list of 19: 19 young adults who availed themselves of Maine’s longstanding tradition of election day registration in 2004. But these voters registered from a nontraditional residence – the Holiday Inn. Rather than simply ask “why?” partisans started pounding tables in September, using this “uncovered” evidence as proof that Mainers should vote to uphold the repeal of same-day registration.
It took a simple phone call to discover that during the 2004 school year, the entire Holiday Inn was, in fact, a St. Joseph’s College dorm housing transfer students whose campus had been ravaged by Hurricane Ivan. Long after the hotel confirmed this fact to the media, the press release “revealing” these students remains on a state political party’s website, ignoring the far less scandalous truth. The only thing these 19 Mainers appear to be guilty of is having had the gall to be displaced by a natural disaster during an election year.
These are two new verses in the same old tune.
The Brennan Center for Justice has monitored and investigated claims of voter fraud for years. We have consistently found that accusations of voter fraud are amplified out of all proportion to reality, and that they frequently reach a crescendo when their appearance would assist one side in a bitter political fight over elections.
Cavalier accusations that someone “may have” committed a crime come at a real price. One Maine student from the list of 206 has written that he fears his future reputation will be tarnished by his name’s quickly-deduced association with a serious election crime. And the victims are not only the targeted students, but every Maine student who hears serious criminal accusations tossed around by politicos and thinks twice about voting in such an intimidating atmosphere. Would you risk casting a perfectly legal ballot if you thought your tuition status or dorm residence might just win you a spot on the next public blacklist?
There’s a reason that opponents of same-day registration couch their accusations with disclaimers, clear their targets of crimes but call them unpatriotic, or use words like “uncovered” without actually identifying a wrong. It’s simple: there’s no proof any of these students did a single thing wrong. Maine’s election law includes numerous safeguards to prevent fraudulent registrations on election day or any other day. The Maine Town and City Clerks Association – the front line protecting Maine’s election integrity - testified that they were concerned the repeal of same-day registration would disenfranchise voters, not protect them. For 37 years, Maine clerks have successfully registered thousands of voters on election day.
That’s why lists built on misinformation and innuendo are the best arguments that same-day registration opponents have to wield.
There is one list that is relevant to the debate over election day registration – the list of 50,000. More than 50,000 Mainers relied on same-day registration to vote in 2008 on days now eliminated under the law. Indeed, as the Bangor Daily News reported, Mainers who have taken advantage of same-day registration include nine lawmakers who voted to repeal it and Governor LePage, who signed the bill into law. Despite the claims of opponents, there’s no evidence that any of these voters did so fraudulently – just conveniently.
So when the next trumped-up accusation of fraud hits the media – and it will – watch as these claims unravel after even the most cursory investigation. Maine deserves better than election policies founded on scare tactics.
Tags: Democracy, Voting Rights & Elections, Allegations of Voter Fraud, Election Day Registration, Student Voting
By Megan Brown – 10/18/11
You may have heard the stories coming out of Maine – but we want you to know the truth.
In July, a politician publicized a list of 206 students paying out-of-state tuition at Maine universities, calling the fact that they voted in Maine “evidence of voter fraud.” The Maine Secretary of State investigated these claims and unsurprisingly found that these students did not commit voter fraud – out-of-state tuition status is simply not a bar to registering or voting in Maine.
In early September, a state political party publicly “uncovered” the fact that 19 students had listed a hotel address on their voter registration cards. However, at that time the hotel was operating as a dorm for students displaced by a hurricane. Under Maine law, students may register to vote using their school address, whether it’s a dormitory, apartment, or house – so long as they consider it their home. There is no evidence these students did anything other than vote where they lived.
Now the Secretary of State has sent letters to Maine students paying out-of-state tuition – yes, the same students who were cleared of all wrongdoing in his investigation – and is asking them to obtain a driver’s license or car registration in Maine if they intend to vote there even though there is no standalone requirement to get a Maine driver’s license unless you intend to drive a car in Maine. The targeted way in which this rule is being enforced against students is unwarranted.
When the initial investigation was announced, we sent Secretary Summers a letter cautioning him against publicizing information that might wrongly intimidate student voters. Today, the ACLU of Maine, along with other voting rights groups, sent a letter to the Maine Secretary of State urging him to stop this continued intimidation of student voters.
No eligible voter should be dissuaded from voting due to misinformation and innuendo. We at the Brennan Center want students to have correct and complete information about their right to participate in the political process. In order to know the truth about voting in Maine, you can refer to the Brennan Center’s Maine Student Voting Guide which provides descriptions of the latest ID, residency, voter registration, and absentee balloting requirements.
Tags: Democracy, Voting Rights & Elections, Allegations of Voter Fraud, Election Day Issues, Election Day Registration, Student Voting
By Megan Brown – 09/22/11
Yesterday Maine Secretary of State Charles Summers, Jr. reaffirmed a basic principle of Maine and federal law: Maine students are eligible to vote in Maine, regardless of whether they pay in-state or out-of-state tuition. In July, Maine Republican Party Chairman Charles Webster accused 206 students who paid “out-of-state” tuition at Maine universities of voter fraud because they voted in Maine. Secretary Summers then announced an investigation into these claims, the results of which he announced today. The result? There was, unsurprisingly, no evidence that any of the 206 students committed voter fraud.
As the Brennan Center noted in a letter to Secretary Summers, under both Maine and federal law the standards for tuition status and voting residency are quite different. Students who meet the legal requirements for residency and choose to register may vote as Maine residents, regardless of their public university tuition status. In fact, if the requirements for in-state tuition were applied to voter residency in Maine, they would be plainly unconstitutional. So the mere fact that some Maine student voters paid out-of-state tuition should never have led to a criminal investigation.
Careless public accusations of voter fraud - especially on such thin evidence – are a serious problem. Misinformed accusations carry the real risk of discouraging eligible voters from registering to vote and casting a ballot. Public officials and political parties alike should share an interest in ensuring that all citizens have accurate information about their voting rights – regardless of the party they intend to cast a vote for.
The results of the investigation released today reaffirm a point we at the Brennan Center have repeatedly made: out-of-state tuition status is not a bar to registering or voting in Maine.
Tags: Democracy, Voting Rights & Elections, Allegations of Voter Fraud, Challenges, Caging & Vote Suppression, Student Voting
By John Travis – 06/28/11
As the push for restrictive voter ID legislation in the states continues, so too does the rhetoric surrounding voter fraud. Last week, New Mexico Secretary of State Dianna Duran doubled down on her previous claims of voter fraud in her state. Not only did the number of the suspected cases of voter fraud balloon from 37 to 64,000, but Duran went a step further in turning over the alleged 64,000 cases to New Mexico State Police for investigation. Noting that law enforcement will be investigating what may largely amount to data entry errors, some have questioned if investigating 64,000 cases —5 percent of registered voters in New Mexico — is a wise use of state resources.
As was the case when Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler unveiled his findings of alleged voter fraud in his state, the conclusions drawn here are questionable. While Duran has not released her methodology and analysis, her description in March of how she and her staff discovered 37 cases of possible voter fraud is of great concern. As previously discussed, Duran claimed to have found 37 possible cases of voter fraud by “matching” the names and birthdays from voter registration lists with a list of foreign nationals. She further claimed to have uncovered 117 individuals whose social security numbers did not match their name. Duran has not explained how this number suddenly ballooned to 64,000.
It is well known why this methodology is problematic and likely to produce false positives: our paper-based voter registration system produces notoriously problematic lists ridden with transcription errors. People use nicknames on forms, and handwriting is often illegible. Among other reasons, transcription errors and the inconsistent entry of compound names means that social security numbers on registration rolls often may not match those in the Social Security Administration’s database. Similarly, lists of foreign nationals are not always updated and often contain the names of eligible voters who have since become citizens. Since these various lists contain millions of names, identifying people who share the same name and birthday is fairly common. Thus, this list of alleged fraudulent voters that Duran’s office has red-flagged as in need of “further review” in all probability amounts to a list of false positives. Given that 5 percent of registered voters in New Mexico may have been red-flagged as a result of administrative errors, a number of officials argued that this “further review” would more effectively be conducted by election officials rather than law enforcement.
To be sure, when officials discover evidence of fraud, it should be turned over to law enforcement. However, calling on law enforcement to investigate possible criminal activity based on discrepancies that may be attributable to clerical errors or basic statistics is unwise, irresponsible, and bordering on fear mongering. It raises a false alarm, wrongly accuses immigrant communities, unfairly faults election officials, and casts doubt on the integrity of elections. As New Mexico law enforcement officials investigate these alleged 64,000 instances, the likelihood is that evidence will uncover the infirmities of a paper-based registration system, not mass voter fraud. Until our voter system is modernized by automating the registration process, flawed database matching will continue to be used to incite fears of voter fraud.
Tags: Democracy, Voting Rights & Elections, Allegations of Voter Fraud, Voter ID
By Keesha Gaskins – 04/01/11
Recently the Secretaries of State in New Mexico and Colorado announced seemingly shocking findings that their research identified “thousands” of non-citizens, apparently voting illegally in their respective states. A careful review of the reports and information released (they have not released the complete set of data and methodology used to arrive at their conclusions) shows some serious problems with the methods used based upon the information they did disclose resulting in questionable conclusions.
The Birthday Problem in New Mexico: Finding False Matches in Comparing Voter Registration Lists and Foreign National Lists
On March 15, 2011 in New Mexico, Secretary of State Dianna Duran issued a statement alleging 37 registered voters whose records “matched” a foreign-nationals list who voted at some point in a general election within the last 8 years in New Mexico. Secretary Duran stated that her office used names and birthdates to affect the matches between the voter registration lists and the lists of foreign nationals. She further stated that 117 registrants from the voter registration list had social security numbers that did not match their name.
Use of names and birthdates in matching lists to conclude that two distinct people on two separate lists are, in fact, the same person is statistically flawed, and has a name – The Birthday Problem. The “Birthday Problem” is a probability puzzle that addresses the statistical likelihood of finding two people with identical birthdays within a population group and illuminates why two people with the same name are likely to share a birthday. Discussed in detail by Dr. Michael McDonald and Justin Levitt, in Seeing Double Voting: An Extension of the Birthday Problem, the study demonstrates that the larger a given population, the more likely you are to see a birthday-name match just on the basis of statistical probabilities.
Statistical coincidence of matching birthdates is a proven phenomenon, studied and reviewed hundreds of times by statisticians and mathematicians.[1] In reviewing the hundreds of thousands of names annually on the list of registered voters in New Mexico and the hundreds of thousands of names on the foreign national license holders lists over an 8‑year period, one should expect to find people on both lists with matching names and birthdates. Consequently, any conclusion of wrongdoing or nefarious conduct, based solely upon name and birthdate matches in a population of hundreds of thousands of people should be viewed with suspicion.
It seems straightforward to compare two data sources to find entries that appear to match. In this case, however, there was no acknowledgment of how the “Birthday Problem” was accounted for and corrected in the analysis in New Mexico. Moreover, there was no indication that the underlying data was evaluated for administrative errors, missing dates or other data flaws prior to matching the names.
Similarly, the failure of 117 people to have Social Security numbers that match their name, cannot, by itself be viewed as evidence of wrongdoing. New Mexico has over 900,000 registered voters, most of whom filled out a voter registration card by hand, from which the data must be entered into a centralized data system. There is no indication that Secretary Duran’s analysis included any evaluation or follow-up to determine if any or all of the 117 mis-matches were the result of data entry errors, unreadable voter registration forms or have some other accidental source for the confusion.
Inconclusive Data, Inadvertent Registrations and No Intent: Overstating Conclusions based upon Self-Admitted Insufficient Data in Colorado
On March 8, 2011 Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler, released a 6-page report alleging that his office is “nearly certain” that 106 American immigrants are improperly registered to vote in Colorado. The blanket conclusion that there are over 11,805 improperly registered voters and of those 4,000 people improperly voted in the 2010 elections are called into question by the qualifying statements and equivocal recommendations contained in the report.
Secretary Gessler’s report admits that the inconclusive voter registration data does not prove that all 11, 805 persons it identified were registered improperly. It concludes that even where there are improper registrations, they could have been due to unintentional registration, clerical or other administrative failure without any intention of the registrants to vote or commit voter fraud. The report is utterly silent on how it arrived at the conclusion that over 4000 of the “improper registrants” voted in the 2010 election. There is simply a barely-supported conclusory statement that “it is likely” that many of the 4,214 registrants in question were not citizens when they cast their vote in 2010. Compare the 106 registered voters that the report alleges are “virtually certain” that they are not citizens, with no attempt to suggest that any of those 106 persons actually voted in 2010 or intended to commit fraud.
Ultimately, it is unclear how many of the 11,805 people that Secretary Gessler’s research identified were, in fact, not citizens at the time of the 2010 election. While his process removed duplicates created when a person used two different non-citizen sources of identification to apply for or renew their driver’s license or identification card, there is no indication that Gessler’s process removed people from the list once they had become citizens. Since 2006, the same time period Gessler used to identify non-citizens, 32,140 individuals became citizens in Colorado. It is certainly reasonable to assume that some, if not many, of the over 4,000 individuals who the report alleged were non-citizens when they voted in 2010 – were, in fact, citizens at the time of the election.
Without the underlying reports and methodologies from New Mexico and Colorado, the conclusions cannot be fully supported or dismissed. With the information we have to date, for all the reasons stated above, any conclusions drawn from these two states must be scrutinized and cannot yet be taken at face value. Neither Secretary Duran nor Secretary Gessler have publicly released the methodology used to arrive at their conclusions, so their results cannot be reviewed or duplicated.
The danger of drawing conclusions without an unambiguous understanding of the accuracy of the data is clear. Recall Florida in 2000, when a list of purged voters later became notorious when it was discovered that the “matching” process captured eligible voters with names similar to - but decidedly different from - the names of persons with felony convictions, sometimes in other states entirely effectively disenfranchising thousands of eligible voters and suppressing the vote in that state.
Until there is the opportunity to review the methodology and analysis used to arrive at the conclusions of the Secretaries of State in New Mexico and Colorado, everyone should blow away the smoke, ignore the mirrors and look at this data critically, with their own eyes.
[1] See generally, W. Feller, An Introduction to Probability Theory and its Applications (3d ed., 1968); Edmund A. Gehan, Note on the “Birthday Problem”, 22 Am. Statistician 28 (1968); Ned Glick, Hijacking Planes to Cuba: An Up-Dated Version of the Birthday Problem, 24 Am. Statistician 41–4 (1970); A. G. Munford, A Note on the Uniformity Assumption in the Birthday Problem, 31 Am. Statistician 119 (1977); M. Sayrafiezadeh, The Birthday Problem Revisited, 67 Mathematics Mag. 220–3 (1994); W. Schwarz, Approximating the Birthday Problem, 42 AM. Statistician 195–6 (1988); D.M. Bloom, A Birthday Problem, 80 Am. Mathematical Monthly 1141–2 (1973); Kumar Joag-Dev & Frank Proschan, Birthday Problem with Unlike Probabilities, 99 Am. Mathematical Monthly 10 (1992). An exception to this scholarship is that adding leap years has a small negative effect on the probability of a birthday match. Philip F. Rust, The Effect of Leap Years and Seasonal Trends on the Birthday Problem, 30 Am. Statistician 197–8 (1976). Geoffrey C. Berresford, The Uniformity Assumption in the Birthday Problem, 53 Mathematics Mag. 286–8 (1980); Rust, supra note 16; Thomas S. Nunnikhoven, A Birthday Problem Solution for Nonuniform Birth Frequencies, 46 Am. Statistician 270–4 (1992).
Tags: Democracy, Voting Rights & Elections, Allegations of Voter Fraud, Voter ID
By Nhu-Y Ngo – 03/06/11
Indiana Secretary of State Charlie White was indicted on seven felony counts on Thursday, including charges of voter fraud. According to special prosecutors, Secretary White intentionally voted in the wrong precinct in the May 2010 primary. Secretary White admitted to the charge, but has said it was not on purpose.
Here is how it apparently all went down: after his 2007 divorce, Secretary White moved from the house he shared with his ex-wife. He moved into an apartment in the same precinct and updated his voter registration record. Around February 2009, he moved out of that apartment and back in with his wife. Later that year in November, Secretary White began to split time between his ex-wife’s house and a recently purchased condo outside the precinct. In February 2010, he changed his voter registration record to reflect his ex-wife’s address as he had not yet closed on his condo and was unsure when he would. Secretary White subsequently failed to update his voter registration record to reflect his own address and voted in the wrong district.
Secretary White blamed a hectic schedule for not updating his registration. Moving (coupled with running for state office, in this specific case) is indeed a stressful time, and many movers, unable to update their registration records in time to vote, are ultimately disenfranchised. In 2008-2009, over 36 million people moved in the United States, and a study by Harvard and Yale universities revealed that our registration system is failing these mobile voters. According to the survey, 12 percent of Florida voters and nearly 10 percent of Los Angeles County voters surveyed reported at least one significant error—such as name, birth date or address—in their record that could prevent them from casting a ballot.
If address changes were automated, permanent, and portable, eligible movers would have their voting records updated automatically, and not face rejection from the ballot box come Election Day. In Secretary White’s case, he would not have had to remember to change his address in the busy period between sale closing and the election. But, alas, Indiana has not modernized its voter registration system.
Tags: Democracy, Voting Rights & Elections, Allegations of Voter Fraud, Voter Registration Modernization
By Nhu-Y Ngo – 12/13/10
As many state legislatures prepare to convene in January, lawmakers across the country – especially the newly elected – are preparing to roll back voting rights. For some, voter ID is the top priority, reflected in pre-filed bills this past month. This is puzzling considering the great number of pressing problems facing the states and the fact that there is little evidence the kind of voter fraud targeted by ID laws is a significant issue.
The Brennan Center has researched the impact of voter identification legislation and the frequency of the only type of voter fraud that voter ID bills have the potential to address: the impersonation of registered voters at the polls. Our research has established that impersonation fraud rarely occurs. Indeed, more Americans are struck by lightning each year. But while there is no credible evidence that impersonation fraud occurs, reliable evidence proves that photo ID and proof of citizenship bills erect hurdles that prevent real citizens from voting. The citizens affected are predominantly elderly and indigent voters, and citizens from minority communities.
Still, the legislative fixation on voter ID remains.
Voter ID bills have been pre-filed in Missouri (including a separate bill with a focus on proof of citizenship, which is certainly more onerous), Nevada, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Texas. Texas State Representative Debbie Riddle was so eager that she dramatically camped out inside the Capitol to be first in line to file voter ID legislation.
And in states with no current pre-filed voter ID bills, prepare yourself for the upcoming legislative avalanche.
Secretaries of State-elect Matt Schultz (Iowa), Scott Gessler (Colorado), Dianna Duran (New Mexico), and Kris Kobach (Kansas) all made voter ID a big issue in their campaigns. And all have publicly stated that they will lobby their respective legislatures to pass voter ID, and in the case of Secretaries-elect Gessler and Kobach, proof of citizenship requirements for voting as well. According to other media reports, lawmakers in North Carolina, Minnesota, and Wisconsin are set to introduce respective voter ID bills this January.
This focus on voter ID is unfortunate considering how much work is needed to modernize our voter registration system. Experts, legislators and election officials across the country agree that our voter registration system is flawed and outdated. As Brennan Center research has demonstrated, lawmakers and election leaders can improve election integrity and security without compromising the right to vote as they move to modernize their systems. Modernization saves millions of dollars a year, boosts registration rates, and increases the accuracy of the rolls. Because the system is much more accurate and because most voter registrations come in through direct contact with government officials, a modern voter registration system is also much more secure and reduces the opportunities for fraud and abuse – not only at the polls but throughout the system. In other words, those concerned about fraud should follow the lead of pioneering state officials, like those in Arizona, Delaware, Georgia, and Washington, and work to upgrade our ailing voter registration system.
And there is promising news. In this sea of restrictive measures, The Houston Chronicle reports that Houston State Senator Rodney Ellis has pre-filed six bills which make up the "Voter Empowerment Package" (Senate Bills 210 to 216). The package includes measures to 1) designate every statewide Election Day as a state holiday, including primary Election Day; 2) allows eligible residents to register for voting during the early voting period at polling locations as long as the eligible resident provides certain documentation; 3) creates criminal penalties for certain deceptive or disenfranchising practices regarding an election; 4) allows eligible residents to register for voting on Election Day at polling locations as long as the eligible resident provides certain documentation; and 5) authorizes registered voters to vote by mail during the early voting period.
In Montana, a pre-filed bill would establish online voter registration in the state, which has proven incredibly successful in many other states.
In New York, lawmakers announced that they plan to introduce legislation to modernize the voter registration system.
These bills demonstrate the right kind of reform that is needed for our patchwork of state registration systems.
But as long some remain fixated on voter ID, they must be prepared demonstrate the requirements are worth the harms they cause—a tough task given the lack of evidence of fraud, as Colorado Common Cause Executive Director Jenny Flanagan to wrote the Denver Post on November 25. Legislators should also be prepared to carry the financial burdens of implementing voter identifications laws that meet constitutional requirements. For if voter ID is to be implemented, states will have to provide ID cards free of charge to those who cannot afford them, to make sure that those cards are widely available, to undertake mass outreach and public education programs on the new requirements, and to include fail-safes and exceptions for certain categories of voters. This adds up to a lot of money—at a time when state budgets are strained.
State officials have a choice: they can improve election integrity, register more voters, and save money by modernizing their voter registration systems or they can push forward with restrictive voter ID requirements that will stress state budgets and contract the franchise. The common sense answer is rather clear. We certainly hope they choose the former and will be happy to work with them on such important reform.
Tags: Democracy, Voting Rights & Elections, Allegations of Voter Fraud, Election Day Issues, Voter ID, Voter Registration Modernization
Page 1 of 3 pages 1 2 3 >
Permalink