Shortly after posting part 1 on voter purge, I read an email from the Brennan Center for Justice, asking for my help in pushing back against "the biggest rollback in voting rights since the Jim Crow era."
The email references three citizens who are having trouble obtaining or maintaining their voting rights, including a veteran in South Carolina who can't vote without the correct state photo ID, but can't get one because he doesn't have his actual Social Security card. Which, of course, he can't get without his South Carolina ID card. I chuckled uncomfortably at this one, remembering my own situation of trying to obtain an ID card without having an ID card.
Also mentioned was a 93 year old woman, who worked for 30 years at the Statehouse in Tennessee. Trusted to clean the building, including the governor's office, she "was almost barred from voting for the first time in decades" because her ID card didn't meet the new standards. She'd been voting all along, without any issue.
The third situation pertains to an 88 year old woman, whose name on her birth certificate doesn't match the name on her ID, so she needs to provide her 65-year old marriage certificate, assuming she's eventually able to find it. Kinda thinking that most married women have one name today and another one when they were born, don't you think?
These are just a few of the many cases that have come to light where seniors, young people, and other traditional Democratic-leaning constituencies have been made to jump through hoops to maintain their right to vote by Republican-controlled state legislatures. The Florida League of Women Voters and Rock the Vote had suspended voter registration drives in protest over the Sunshine State's new laws, and only recently went back to work there.
But here's the thing -- regardless of which party is behind the changing rules or the voter registration drives, the real problem is that so many eligible voters don't vote. That should be a bigger concern, and more important area of focus, than disenfranchising the ones who do.
Showing posts with label Judicial Watch. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Judicial Watch. Show all posts
June 20, 2012
June 19, 2012
Voter Purge or Cash Splurge? (Part 1)
Last week I received a call from a nice woman reaching out on behalf of Judicial Watch, urging me to contribute $75 or more to their 2012 Election Integrity Project effort to purge the rolls of ineligible voters.
The pitch started with me being advised that there are currently over 2 million dead people registered to vote. I asked where these people were, and was advised, "well, they're right here in America, all across the United States, literally millions of dead people still on the voter rolls."
I asked how many of them had actually voted; she was not able to answer my question, but forged ahead, explaining how dangerous it was that this year's election could be stolen -- stolen! -- by ineligible voters, and that we needed photo ID and needed to purge all of the ineligible and dead voters from the polls to provide us election integrity. Paraphrasing her concern, the issue was that states will mail voter notices to dead people, and they will be picked up and used by living people with nefarious intent to elect the wrong person and throw the country into turmoil.
I asked her where she lived and what proof of identity she had to show to vote in the last election. According to her, in Phoenix, you just have to show up with the card you got in the mail, and you can vote. Silly Arizonans, I thought -- with their illegal immigration issues, you'd think they'd require more than that. And of course they do -- I checked the rules for proof of identification, which boldly declare Every qualified elector is required to show proof of identity at the polling place before receiving a ballot.
Oh dear -- was I lied to?
Here in Onondaga County, in Central New York, I have to (1) show up at the right polling place; (2) be listed in the log; and (3) sign the book with a signature that matches the one that's on file with the Board of Elections.
I'm thinking that's a pretty good protection -- not a perfect one, I agree, but pretty darn good. And while I'm not diabolically opposed to having to show ID to vote, the risk of someone voting using a fake ID seems much higher than that of someone having enough interest in 'fake voting' to take the time to get hold of and practice my atrocious signature and then show up at the right place to pretend they're me.
I want elections to be fair and honest and reasonable as much as the next guy. I think that states should maintain accurate voter registration records. I think if a state allows someone to vote simply because they have a polling place card in their hands, they need to have their heads examined. But I think Judicial Watch is stretching it with their belief that "Allowing the names of ineligible voters to remain on the voting rolls harms the integrity of the electoral process and undermines voter confidence in the legitimacy of elections."
In part two, I'll talk about the things that really harm the integrity and undermine voter confidence. Trust me, it's not dead people.
The pitch started with me being advised that there are currently over 2 million dead people registered to vote. I asked where these people were, and was advised, "well, they're right here in America, all across the United States, literally millions of dead people still on the voter rolls."
I asked how many of them had actually voted; she was not able to answer my question, but forged ahead, explaining how dangerous it was that this year's election could be stolen -- stolen! -- by ineligible voters, and that we needed photo ID and needed to purge all of the ineligible and dead voters from the polls to provide us election integrity. Paraphrasing her concern, the issue was that states will mail voter notices to dead people, and they will be picked up and used by living people with nefarious intent to elect the wrong person and throw the country into turmoil.
I asked her where she lived and what proof of identity she had to show to vote in the last election. According to her, in Phoenix, you just have to show up with the card you got in the mail, and you can vote. Silly Arizonans, I thought -- with their illegal immigration issues, you'd think they'd require more than that. And of course they do -- I checked the rules for proof of identification, which boldly declare Every qualified elector is required to show proof of identity at the polling place before receiving a ballot.
Oh dear -- was I lied to?
Here in Onondaga County, in Central New York, I have to (1) show up at the right polling place; (2) be listed in the log; and (3) sign the book with a signature that matches the one that's on file with the Board of Elections.
I'm thinking that's a pretty good protection -- not a perfect one, I agree, but pretty darn good. And while I'm not diabolically opposed to having to show ID to vote, the risk of someone voting using a fake ID seems much higher than that of someone having enough interest in 'fake voting' to take the time to get hold of and practice my atrocious signature and then show up at the right place to pretend they're me.
I want elections to be fair and honest and reasonable as much as the next guy. I think that states should maintain accurate voter registration records. I think if a state allows someone to vote simply because they have a polling place card in their hands, they need to have their heads examined. But I think Judicial Watch is stretching it with their belief that "Allowing the names of ineligible voters to remain on the voting rolls harms the integrity of the electoral process and undermines voter confidence in the legitimacy of elections."
In part two, I'll talk about the things that really harm the integrity and undermine voter confidence. Trust me, it's not dead people.
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