#voter preregistration

[1theneighborhoodcoffeeaddict1]

3/17/25

[odinsblog]

🗣️THIS IS WHAT INCLUSIVE, COMPASSIONATE DEMOCRACY LOOKS LIKE

Minnesota Dems enacted a raft of laws to make the state a trans refuge, and ensure people receiving trans care here can't be reached by far-right governments in places like Florida and Texas. (link)

Minnesota Dems ensured that everyone, including undocumented immigrants, can get drivers' licenses. (link)

They made public college free for the majority of Minnesota families. (link)

Minnesota Dems dropped a billion dollars into a bevy of affordable housing programs, including by creating a new state housing voucher program. (link)

Minnesota Dems massively increased funding for the state's perpetually-underfunded public defenders, which lets more public defenders be hired and existing public defenders get a salary increase. (link)

Dems raised Minnesota education spending by 10%, or about 2.3 billion. (link)

Minnesota Dems created an energy standard for 100% carbon-free electricity by 2040. (link)

Minnesota already has some of the strongest election infrastructure (and highest voter participation) in the country, but the legislature just made it stronger, with automatic registration, preregistration for minors, and easier access to absentee ballots. (link)

Minnesota Dems expanded the publicly subsidized health insurance program to undocumented immigrants. This one's interesting because it's the sort of things Dems often balk at. The governor opposed it! The legislature rolled over him and passed it anyway. (link)

Minnesota Dems expanded background checks and enacted red-flag laws, passing gun safety measures that the GOP has thwarted for years. (link)

Minnesota Dems gave the state AG the power to block the huge healthcare mergers that have slowly gobbled up the state's medical system. (link)

Minnesota Dems restored voting rights to convicted felons as soon as they leave prison. (link)

Minnesota Dems made prison phone calls free. (link)

Minnesota Dems passed new wage protection rules for the construction industry, against industry resistance. (link)

Minnesota Dems created a new sales tax to fund bus and train lines, an enormous victory for the sustainability and quality of public transit. Transit be more pleasant to ride, more frequent, and have better shelters, along more lines. (link)

They passed strict new regulations on PFAS ("forever chemicals"). (link)

Minnesota Dems passed the largest bonding bill in state history! Funding improvements to parks, colleges, water infrastructure, bridges, etc. etc. etc. (link)

They're going to build a passenger train from the Twin Cities to Duluth. (link)

I can't even find a news story about it but there's tens of millions in funding for new BRT lines, too. (link)

A wonky-but-important change: Minnesota Dems indexed the state gas tax to inflation, effectively increasing the gas tax. (link)

They actually indexed a bunch of stuff to inflation, including the state's education funding formula, which helps ensure that school spending doesn't decline over time. (link)

Minnesota Dems made hourly school workers (e.g., bus drivers and paraprofessionals) eligible for unemployment during summer break, when they're not working or getting paid. (link)

Minnesota Dems passed a bunch of labor protections for teachers, including requiring school districts to negotiate class sizes as part of union contracts. (Yet another @SydneyJordanMN special here. (link)

Minnesota Dems created a state board to govern labor standards at nursing homes. (link)

Minnesota Dems created a Prescription Drug Affordability Board, which would set price caps for high-cost pharmaceuticals. (link)

Minnesota Dems created new worker protections for Amazon warehouse workers and refinery workers. (link)

Minnesota Dems passed a digital fair repair law, which requires electronics manufacturers to make tools and parts available so that consumers can repair their electronics rather than purchase new items. (link)

Minnesota Dems made Juneteenth a state holiday. (link)

Minnesota Dems banned conversion therapy. (link)

They spent nearly a billion dollars on a variety of environmental programs, from heat pumps to reforestation. (link)

Minnesota Dems expanded protections for pregnant and nursing workers - already in place for larger employers - to almost everyone in the state. (link)

Minnesota Dems created a new child tax credit that will cut child poverty by about a quarter. (link)

Minnesota Democrats dropped a quick $50 million into homelessness prevention programs. (link)

And because the small stuff didn't get lost in the big stuff, they passed a law to prevent catalytic converter thefts. (link)

Minnesota Dems increased child care assistance. (link)

Minnesota Dems banned "captive audience meetings," where employers force employees to watch anti-union presentations. (link)

No news story yet, but Minnesota Dems forced signal priority changes to Twin Cities transit. Right now the trains have to wait at intersections for cars, which, I can say from experience, is terrible. Soon that will change.

Minnesota Dems provided the largest increase to nursing home funding in state history. (link)

They also bumped up salaries for home health workers, to help address the shortage of in-home nurses. (link)

Minnesota Dems legalized drug paraphernalia, which allows social service providers to conduct needle exchanges and address substance abuse with reduced fear of incurring legal action. (link)

Minnesota Dems banned white supremacists and extremists from police forces, capped probation at 5 years for most crimes, improved clemency, and mostly banned no-knock warrants. (link)

Minnesota Dems also laid the groundwork for a public health insurance option. (link)

I’m happy for the people of Minnesota, but as a Floridian living under Ron DeSantis & hateful Republicans, I’m also very envious tbh. We know that democracy can work, and this is a shining example of what government could be like in the hands of legislators who actually care about helping people in need, and not pursuing the GOP’s “culture wars” and suppressing the votes of BIPOC, and inflicting maximum harm on those who aren’t cis/het, white, wealthy, Christian males. BRAVO MINNESOTA. This is how you do it! And the Minnesota Dems did it with a one seat majority, so no excuses. Forget about the next election and focus on doing as much good as you can, while you still can. 👏🏿👏🏿👏🏿👏🏿👏🏿👏🏿👏🏿

👉🏿 https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1660846689450688514.html

[stewieisnotonfire]

the 2024 general election is coming up in november. in order to vote, you must have your registration by then. however, many states have pre registration laws. for example, in texas you may register at 17 years 10 months old. if you are 18 the day of the election and you live in a state with preregistration laws, work to get your registration asap. young people are abstaining from voting at alarming rates, and anyone who can vote needs to vote.

here is information on preregistration by state.

[tomorrowusa]

Are you a high school senior who will be 18 years old by 13 February 2024 and who lives in George Santos's old district (NY-03)? You can make a big difference in the first US House election of 2024.

While Republican Santos won in NY-03 in 2022, Joe Biden carried this area in 2020 by a comfortable margin. The February special election is rated as a TOSSUP by pundits across the political spectrum.

With the expulsion of Santos, there are now 221 Republicans, 213 Democrats, and 1 vacancy in the US House. With the impending resignation of Kevin McCarthy, the GOP total will drop to 220; it's uncertain when a special election would take place for McCarthy's seat. So a Democratic victory in NY-03 in February would narrow the margin to 220 Republicans, 214 Dems, and 1 vacancy. And a victory in February would also give an advantage to Democrats in that district in the November general election.

The February election in NY-03 is being looked upon as a national bellwether. A Republican defeat would not bode well for Trump and his plans to become a dictator.

9,000 18-year-olds have an opportunity to register and vote in the election to fill George Santos’s vacant seat.  Most 18-year-olds in the district are not yet registered to vote. The third Congressional District includes parts of Queens and Nassau County. In these counties, only 6.4% and 18.5% of 16- and 17-year-olds, respectively, were preregistered to vote as of February 2023. The registration rates for 18-year-olds today are unlikely to be dramatically higher than these preregistration rates. 

You don't have to be 18 to register, but you must be 18 on or before Election Day to actually vote; that means February 13th for the NY-03 special election.

New York has relatively easy online voter registration, but you'll need a NY official ID to register.

Online Voter Registration | New York State Board of Elections

Personally, I think it's a good idea to register in person. The clerks can directly answer any questions you have without having to go through a complicated menu. Plus it feels like a rite of passage when you do it in person. You also have the advantage of getting some sort of hard copy receipt which can be useful if there's an electronic glitch.

For a map to find the cities and town in the district, click here.Then ask everyone you know in the district to make sure they are registered to vote and that everyone in their family has registered, as well. 

This is a general map. NY-03 covers parts of Queens and Nassau County – but not all of Queens and Nassau County.

This site is best known for letting people know who their state legislators are. But if you scroll down a bit on the left to Federal it will tell you which congressional district you're in.

^^^ So they haven't removed Santos from the search results. But the important thing is that it shows you're in the 3rd US House district in New York.

Of course any US citizen over 18 in NY-03 can vote in the February election. So share this information with anybody who you think isn't registered or has moved since the last election.

If you've moved since the last election, even if just across the street, you need to register at your new address. Voter registration is based specifically on geography.

[mariacallous]

Abstract

Progress toward gender equality is thwarted by the underrepresentation of women in political leadership, even as most Americans report they would vote for women candidates. Here, we hypothesize that women candidates are often disadvantaged by pragmatic bias, a tendency to withhold support for members of groups for whom success is perceived to be difficult or impossible to achieve. Across six studies (N = 7,895), we test whether pragmatic bias impedes women’s access to a highly significant political leadership position—the US presidency. In two surveys, 2020 Democratic primary voters perceived women candidates to be less electable, and these beliefs were correlated with lower intentions to vote for women candidates (Studies 1 and 2). Voters identified many reasons women would be less electable than men, including others’ unwillingness to vote for women, biased media coverage, and higher requirements to prove themselves. We next tested interventions to reduce pragmatic bias. Merely correcting misperceptions of Americans’ reported readiness for a woman president did not increase intentions to vote for a woman (Study 3). However, across three experiments (including one preregistered on a nationally representative sample), presenting evidence that women earn as much support as men in US general elections increased Democratic primary voters’ intentions to vote for women presidential candidates, an effect driven by heightened perceptions of these candidates’ electability (Studies 4 to 6). These findings highlight that social change efforts can be thwarted by people’s sense of what is possible, but this may be overcome by credibly signaling others’ willingness to act collectively.

Significance

Women remain underrepresented in political leadership in the United States and beyond. While abundant research has studied the possible impact of gender stereotypes on support for women candidates, our research finds that voters also withhold support for women candidates because they perceive practical barriers to women successfully attaining political leadership positions. We find that providing Democratic primary voters with evidence that women earn as much electoral support as men in US general elections increased intentions to vote for women candidates. Our results suggest that women face complex barriers that prevent gender equity in politics, and these barriers can be reduced when voters believe that Americans not only want but also will take action to support women candidates.

[elizabethhenstridge-updates]

Elizabeth via instagram | Many states allow voter preregistration for 16- and 17-year olds! For more info: https://iamavoter.com

[nicollekidman]

i hope you’re doing okay angel

that’s so so amazing i’m super proud of you and your friend!!!!!!!! that shows so much dedication and hope, i love you 

[patriotsnet]

Are The Republicans Caucusing In Iowa

New Post has been published on https://www.patriotsnet.com/are-the-republicans-caucusing-in-iowa/

Are The Republicans Caucusing In Iowa

Winners Of The Iowa Caucus Since 2000

The 2020 Iowa caucuses, explained

Highlighted names became the partys presidential nominee.

Democrats

Our reporters provided real-time updates from the ground in Iowa.

Trip Gabriel, reporting from Des Moines Feb. 9, 2020

The Iowa Democrats released a new delegate count, but The AP hasnt called the race and the Sanders team says it will request a recanvass. Read more »

Trip Gabriel, reporting from Des Moines Feb. 8, 2020

Theyre still not done counting in Iowa. The state party says it will re-examine 95 precincts after receiving evidence of inconsistencies. Read more »

Reid Epstein, reporting from Manchester, N.H. Feb. 7, 2020

Buttigieg has taken 13 pledged delegates out of Iowa, and Sanders has won 12, according to AP. But theres one left to be allocated. Read more »

Maggie Astor, in New York Feb. 6, 2020

The Associated Press is unable to declare a winner, it now says. We could know the winner of New Hampshire before we know the winner of Iowa.

Reid Epstein, reporting from Manchester, N.H. Feb. 6, 2020

After DNC chair calls for a recanvass in Iowa, the Iowa Democratic Party chair says theyll conduct an audit if a campaign requests it. Read more »

Sydney Ember, in New York Feb. 6, 2020

Sanders declares a very strong victory based on the popular initial vote. Buttigieg has declared victory as well. Read more in our live updates »

Reid Epstein, reporting from Manchester, N.H. Feb. 6, 2020

Jennifer Medina, in Los Angeles Feb. 6, 2020

Lisa Lerer, on a flight to New Hampshire Feb. 6, 2020

Where Are The Caucuses Held

A caucus is usually held at a school or other public building in a precinct, depending on expected turnout. Churches, union halls, fire stations, businesses and private homes also serve as caucus sites.

Find your polling place through the Iowa Democratic Party;or the;Republican Party of Iowa.

Look up Republican caucus locations at the Republican Party of Iowa website

Some locations will host caucuses for multiple precincts on caucus night, so it will;be helpful;to know your precinct number so that you caucus with the right group.;

To find your precinct, go to the Secretary of States website:

Both parties recommend arriving 30 to 45 minutes early. The Democratic Party specifies;that you must be;signed in or in line by 7 p.m. to participate.

Iowa Caucus : Live Results And Analysis

The Iowa caucuses are kind of like neighborhood meetings where people get together and out in the open, with no secret ballot try to win over their friends, family and neighbors to support their preferred candidate.

The caucuses start a months-long process that eventually leads to the selection of 41 delegates, who will vote for a candidate at the party’s national convention. It’s a complex, unique and exhausting process that might go a little differently if done in a place that was temperamentally unlike Iowa.

The caucuses quadrennially come under fire for being overwhelmingly white and not representative of the country, let alone the Democratic Party. But the candidates have spent millions there and over the past 40 years, and it has been very predictive of who becomes the Democratic nominee.

Let’s break down how all this works.

What time do the caucuses take place?

They begin at 7 p.m. CT and are expected to last roughly an hour. The Iowa Democratic Party is trying to expedite the process this year with just two rounds of caucusing, so they may very well be wrapped up in less than an hour.

Who can vote?

The caucuses are “open.” In other words, any registered voter in the state can participate.

But for as much attention as the caucuses get, not many Iowans actually participate. In 2016, for example, fewer than 16% of people eligible to vote actually caucused.

Where do the caucuses happen?

How will we know who wins?

the statewide preference after the first alignment;

Don’t Miss: Republican Flag Pins

Tips For Caucusing With Kids

Yes, it can get heated. I remember seeing a friend of mine with one baby in a carrier, and two girls on each of her hands. She proudly stood in her candidates corner and stood back to listen to the process. She chimed in when she wanted, and her kids watched her the entire time. They were seeing their mother stand for what she believes in.

Changes In The 2020 Democratic Caucus

Two counts: In previous cycles, caucusgoers could realign multiple times. Starting this year, there is only one realignment and people who supported a viable candidate cannot vote again.

Satellite caucuses: For the first time in 2020, Democrats have allowed caucuses at;dozens of satellite locations, both in Iowa and in other states and three other countries, to allow people who could not caucus at 7 p.m. at their assigned precinct in Iowa to participate. Some of those satellite caucuses start earlier or later than 7 p.m. and some require preregistration.

Reporting results: Democrats will make public the raw vote numbers from the first and second alignments, as well as the delegate strength candidates have. In previous years, the party;reported only the delegate strength.;

View the final delegate totals as well as the first and second alignment vote numbers at DesMoinesRegister.com on Feb. 3.

Recommended Reading: How Many Republicans In Congress

A Wild Card For 202: The Trump Factor

Even as potential candidates begin making early moves in Iowa, Trumps shadow looms.

At the Conservative Political Action Conference in February, he continued to falsely claim he won the 2020 election and teased a 2024 campaign, saying I may even decide to beat them for a third time.

Trump remains popular among Iowa Republicans, who voted to send him back to the White House by an 8 percentage point margin. According to a , 89% of Iowa Republicans view him favorably.

And at CPAC in February, a straw poll showed him dominating a field of potential candidates. Trump won easily, earning 55% of the vote. At 21%, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was the only other Republican to crack into double digits.

But Kaufmann said he doesnt believe politicians run the risk of alienating Trump or his supporters simply by showing up in Iowa.

In my conversations with many of these leaders and I’ve had conversations with many of them not one time, not one time did I hear one of these national leaders or a member of their team actually say anything negative or even imply anything negative towards the former president,” he said. “So no, I don’t think there’s any risk whatsoever.

But some Republicans say theyre ready to move on from Trump. Longtime Iowa operative Doug Gross said in January after the U.S. Capitol attack on Jan. 6;that he would personally try to block Trumps rise in Iowa if he were to run again.

It Might Just Be Game Over For The Iowa Caucuses

The states with the most privileged places on the presidential primary calendar are finding their roles more threatened than ever before.

Link Copied

The siege of Iowa and New Hampshire has begun.

The two states with privileged places on the presidential primary calendar are finding their roles more threatened than ever before most recently in the form of a bill introduced in Nevada this week to move that states nominating contest to the front of the line in 2024.

On its own, the Nevada encroachment would mean little. For years, Iowa and New Hampshire have successfully defended their one-two position from states eager to jump ahead. But the combination of Iowas botched 2020 caucus and increasing diversity in the Democratic Partys ranks has made the whiteness of Iowa and New Hampshire all the more conspicuous, putting the two states on their heels and throwing the 2024 calendar into turmoil.

Theres no reason in the world that those states should go forward so early, because theyre not representative of what 90 percent of the countrys all about, said former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat who remains influential in party politics. America looks different than it did 50 years ago, when these traditions were put in place, and the Democratic electorate looks really different.

He added, Its no longer palatable, as far as Im concerned, for those states to take precedence over states like South Carolina and Nevada.

Filed Under:

Read Also: Are There Republicans Running For President

The 2024 Iowa Caucus Campaign Has Already Begun

Trump’s preeminence in the Republican Party isn’t stopping would-be successors from campaigning and recruiting supporters in Iowa.

06/28/2021 04:30 AM EDT

Link Copied

WEST DES MOINES, Iowa Former President Donald Trump would be the overwhelming frontrunner for the Republican Partys nomination should he wage a 2024 comeback bid. But thats not stopping his would-be GOP successors from barreling into Iowa.

Only months after Trumps election defeat, Republicans are laying the groundwork for the all-important, first-in-the-nation presidential caucuses. Potential candidates are hopscotching across the state to fundraise, campaign for midterm hopefuls and appear at traditional party dinners that mark the start of caucus season.

And behind the scenes, Republicans are making overtures to influential activists, meeting with party leaders and hiring operatives with deep experience in Iowa, which is still expected to be the first 2024 contest for Republicans even though Democrats are grappling with whether to change their nominating calendar.

The burst of early activity which is set to accelerate over the summer months illustrates how Republicans are maneuvering with an eye toward succeeding Trump. A Trump bid would likely extinguish their hopes of becoming the partys nominee, and at least one candidate has said they won’t run if if Trump does. But would-be contenders are wasting no time preparing for the possibility of an open nominating contest.

Filed Under:

What Is The Iowa Caucus

Iowa caucus: Republicans make presence known at Democrat events

The Iowa Caucus system begins with a group of 1,679 precinct caucuses that start the four-part presidential and midterm electoral process for both Democratic and Republican parties in Iowa. Precinct caucuses are party member meetings held in schools, libraries, churches and similar venues.

Can I participate?

Anyone who is an Iowa resident and of voting age can attend. Those not yet registered to vote, are able to complete registration before going in. If a potential participants registration is for a different party, party registration can be switched at the door. Meeting leaders are chosen, sometimes presidential candidates or candidate representatives briefly speak, the caucus participants discuss the candidates, and voteRepublicans on paper, Democrats with their feet. By the close of the caucus, delegates have been selected to go on to each partys county, district and state conventions.

Don’t Miss: Are There Any Republicans Challenging Trump

Meet Trumps Gop Opposition

Suffice it to say, neither Walsh nor Weld has much chance against Trump. Walsh has already announced that he will not be on the ballot in his home state of Illinois, citing a lack of resources and the need to focus on Iowa and New Hampshire. Ive contacted Weld and Walsh for comment and will update if and when I hear back.

Part of it is that we have to convince a lot of the Republican donors that there is a viable option and theyre going to want to see results before they put money into our organization, a spokesperson told the Chicago Sun-Times. And while Weld has polled well in New Hampshire, his numbers are far outmatched by Trumps.

But victory isnt necessarily the point of either mans long-shot bid for the White House. Rather, their campaigns are intended as signals to Trump-skeptical Republicans that theyre not alone in their opposition to the president.

For Weld, his focus is on restoring normalcy to the Republican Party as a real Republican. When I spoke with the former governor back in August and asked him about Trumps considerable popularity with the GOP, he told me, Im not willing to concede your premise. I will concede that Im a normal Republican, and the implication of that is that Mr. Trump is a Republican in name only.

He believes Republican voters are looking for fiscal conservatism and a small-government ethos from a presidential candidate willing to stand up for the taxpayer.

Weld has a lengthy political history, as I detailed last year:

Chaos As Democratic Party Blames Iowa Caucus Delays On ‘inconsistencies’ As It Happened

Help us cover the critical issues of 2020. Consider making a contribution

Joan E Greve in Des Moines

Tue 4 Feb 2020 07.27;GMT First published on Mon 3 Feb 2020 23.17;GMT

Elizabeth Warren, who had to be in Washington earlier today for the Senate impeachment trial, appeared at a Des Moines caucus site to deliver her campaign pitch in person.

Jess Bidgood

Warren speaks at Roosevelt High School caucus site in Des Moines. Layout of the room means shes making her unity pitch right in front of the Bernie corner. Opposing chants of warren! Warren! And Bernie beats trump as she leaves

Sam Levine

Eighteen Iowans made history Tuesday evening as they became the first people to participate in a caucus hosted entirely in American Sign Language in Des Moines.

Elizabeth Warren, Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg were the three viable candidates after the first round of voting. Warren ultimately earned two delegates while Biden and Buttigieg earned one each.

But for many who attended, the significance of the event extended beyond choosing a nominee. It was the first time many had caucused, since the process can be so exclusionary towards deaf people.

Ive been paying my taxes for several years … We should be able to be involved in the political process, but due to communication, not being able to hear, it was a barrier before, August Cordero said.

Sam Levine

Recommended Reading: Why Is The Media Against Republicans

What To Know About The Iowa Caucuses

After months of campaigning, debating, polling, fundraising and eating fried food, Democratic presidential candidates face their first real-world test on Feb. 3, when Iowa voters have their say in the states caucuses. Heres a rundown of important things to know about Iowa and its first-in-the-nation vote.

What is;a caucus, and how is it different from a primary?

While primaries are run much like general elections lots of polling places, a secret ballot, many hours to vote Iowas caucuses are more like neighborhood meetings. Starting at 7 p.m. in each of the states 1,678 voting precincts , Democratic voters will gather, debate issues and candidates with each other, and eventually cluster in preference groups to elect delegates to their county conventions. The precinct caucuses kick off a process which, several months from now, will result in 41 delegates being chosen to represent Iowa at the Democratic National Convention. The whole caucus process, which can take more than an hour, is nicely illustrated here.

Iowas Democratic caucuses are open only to registered party members, not unaffiliated voters or those registered as Republicans or with other parties. However, people can register or change their party affiliation on caucus night if they want to participate.

How many people turn out for the caucuses?

How will we know who wins?

How reliably do the Iowa caucuses predict the ultimate nominee?

How many other states and territories use caucuses?

Republican V Democratic Caucuses

The Republican and Democratic caucus processes are very different. The Republican caucus is conducted by a vote, usually on sheets of paper. I have been to caucuses for both parties. The Republican caucus is often in a lecture hall as it is more conducive for sitting.

The Democratic caucus is a bit more complicated. It is an exciting visual demonstration of democracy. The Democratic caucus-goers congregate in a room based on which candidate they support. Some may be undecided, and they often sit in the middle of the room. Then, the caucus-goers try to sway their peers toward one candidate or another. Ive never been to a caucus with food, but Ive heard a plate of desserts has been known to decide a race.

Recommended Reading: Who Is Better Republicans Or Democrats

‘it’s Absolutely Earlier Than Before’

After breakfast with the Westside Conservatives Club, Pompeo planned;a meeting with the Bull Moose Club in downtown Des Moines with Terry Branstad, the former Iowa governor and former U.S. ambassador to China. The day before, Pompeo met with the Pottawattamie County Republicans at an event in Council Bluffs.;

Pompeo, who was a U.S. representative for the state of Kansas and the director of the Central Intelligence Agency before becoming secretary of state, previously was in Iowa last summer to speak at the Family Leadership Summit hosted by the Family Leader, a Christian conservative advocacy group.

Hes among a handful of Republicans who found reasons to travel to Iowa last year, including Tim Scott, Haley, Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas and South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem. Former Vice President Mike Pence was also a frequent visitor to Iowa while serving in the Trump administration.

Rick Scott, who is also the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, will be in Cedar Rapids April 1 for an event organized by the Republican Party of Iowa. And Tim Scott will return to speak at a party event in Davenport April 15.

Kaufmann said the presidential activity is beginning sooner than it has in past years.

It is absolutely earlier than before, he said. No doubt about it.

Would-be candidates followed a similar schedule at the outset of the 2016 cycle, as Republicans made;their first visits to the state in May of 2013.;

Iowa Gop Chair Predicts State Will Keep First

JAMES Q. LYNCH

Republican presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, arrives for a caucus night rally Monday in Des Moines. Cruz sealed a victory in the Republican Iowa caucuses.

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Its getting harder for Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel to say its too soon to know whether Iowa will again host the first-in-the-nation presidential caucuses.

Thats because her handpicked chairman of the panel that will set the GOPs national nomination calendar for 2024 keeps telling Iowa Republicans they will kick off the quadrennial process of choosing a nominee.

I’m in Iowa, so weve got to talk about it, but I don’t like getting ahead of my committee, McDaniel said when asked about Republican Party of Iowa Chairman Jeff Kaufmann saying matter-of-factly that Iowa will retain its leadoff status in the coming presidential election cycle.

The final decision, McDaniel said, will be up to the 168 RNC members representing Republicans in the United States and its territories.

I have to remain neutral, McDaniel said, adding that shes not hearing chatter within the party to change the nomination calendar.

Kaufmann feels no such obligation to remain neutral. And hes chattering plenty.

I do have an opinion about where Iowa should be in the nomination process, he said while introducing the chairwoman Aug. 28 to about 700 people at 1st District U.S. Rep. Ashley Hinsons BBQ Bash.

Also Check: Who Has More Billionaires Democrats Or Republicans

[orbemnews]

Fact check: Breaking down 10 claims about the Democrats' elections bill Here is a fact check of some of the claims lawmakers made at the hearing; the Republicans present made a larger number of checkable assertions about what is in the bill, so we checked more claims from them than from the Democrats present. Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas claimed: “Under this bill, there’s automatic registration of anybody — if you get a driver’s license, if you get a welfare payment, if you get an unemployment payment, if you attend a public university. Now everyone knows there are millions of illegal aliens who have driver’s licenses, who are getting welfare benefits, who attend public universities. … ” Facts First: It is not true that the bill automatically registers “anybody” to vote. The bill does not change current law banning people who aren’t US citizens, including undocumented immigrants, from registering to vote in federal elections. While the bill does require every state to adopt an “automatic voter registration” system, it repeatedly makes clear that only citizens are eligible to be registered. The bill says people would have to affirm that they are US citizens before they were added to the voter rolls. It also says the government agencies involved in the registration process would inform only US citizens that they would be registered to vote unless they chose to opt out. And it says the agencies would be required to send elections officials not only people’s names but also “information showing that the individual is a citizen of the United States.” The word “automatic” in “automatic voter registration” does not mean that there can be no verification measures. Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson testified later in the hearing that her state’s automatic voter registration system includes “six checks” to ensure that only eligible citizens get registered. It is true that there have sometimes been errors under state automatic voter registration systems that resulted in noncitizens getting registered to vote. But there have also been errors in states without automatic voter registration. Daniel Weiner, deputy director of the Election Reform Program at New York University’s liberal Brennan Center for Justice, said in an interview that automatic voter registration “increases the accuracy” of the voter rolls, “not the other way around.” Registration for 16-year-olds West Virginia Secretary of State Mac Warner, a Republican, expressed concerns about the automatic voter registration provisions. Warner warned that the bill “overrules checks and balances in our election security. It mandates AVR, including 16-year-olds.” Facts First: This needs context. While it’s true that the bill would require states to allow individuals as young as 16 to register to vote, the text explicitly says that nothing in the bill requires states to let individuals vote before they turn 18 — and that the bill has “no effect” on states’ own voting age requirements. The policy of registering people before they turn 18 but not yet allowing them to vote, known as preregistration, already exists in several states in varying forms. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, at least 23 states allowed individuals under 18 years old to preregister to vote as of February 2019. Fourteen states and the District of Columbia allowed preregistration at 16 years old, while four states, including West Virginia, allowed 17-year-olds to preregister. (The other five states have different age requirements.) Specifically, the West Virginia secretary of state’s website says that people who are 17 years old and will turn 18 before the next general election can register. (It also says “17 year olds may register and vote in primary elections if they turn 18 before the next general election.”) Criminals and the vote “This bill is designed to get criminals to vote,” Cruz said. “This bill says, ‘If you’re a murderer, if you’re a rapist, if you’re a child molester, we the Democrats want you voting.’ ” Facts First: This needs context. The bill would not force states to allow incarcerated felons to vote. It would require states to allow people who committed felonies to vote once they are no longer incarcerated. “Individuals who have completed a felony sentence would have their right to vote in federal elections reinstated once they are released from custody or receive a probation sentence,” Matthew Weil, director of the Elections Project at the Bipartisan Policy Center think tank, said in an email. “States would be required to notify these individuals of their re-enfranchisement.” In a bipartisan vote on March 2, the House voted 328-97 to defeat an amendment from progressive Democrats to extend federal voting rights to people who are still incarcerated. The prevalence of voter fraud Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi claimed that voter fraud is “rampant.” Facts First: This is just not true. Voter fraud is exceedingly rare in the United States. There is no evidence of widespread fraud in the 2020 general election. Voter identification laws Warner, the West Virginia secretary of state, said the bill “bans ID laws.” Facts First: This is false. The bill does not prohibit states from having voter identification laws. Rather, it requires states to give voters an alternative to showing the ID the states normally require — specifically, to allow voters who do not show ID to instead submit signed statements under penalty of perjury attesting to their identity and eligibility to vote. Critics are entitled to argue that this provision weakens or undermines voter ID laws, but it’s just not true to say the bill “bans” such laws. For absentee ballot applications in particular, the law says states can’t require any form of identification except for a signature or “similar affirmation.” It says, though, that this policy has “no effect” on ID requirements for first-time voters registering by mail. And as the National Conference of State Legislatures notes on its website, state voter ID requirements generally don’t apply to mail-in or absentee ballots anyway. “Many states allow registered voters to request an absentee ballot completely online if they are already registered to vote,” Weil said. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, made a more nuanced claim than Warner did, saying that “popular policies like voter ID requirements would be banned unless states neutered them with loopholes.” This claim at least hinted that the bill does not include a total prohibition on voter ID laws. The bill and a North Carolina scandal Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi said: “As I recall, a member from North Carolina, a Republican, was elected in a close election and was expelled or not seated from the House of Representatives because he engaged in ballot harvesting, which was illegal under the law of North Carolina but would be not only legal but required to be legal in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.” Facts First: This is misleading. While the Democrats’ bill would require states to allow voters to designate other people of their choice to submit their sealed absentee ballots for them, it would not legalize the fraudulent activity that allegedly occurred in this 2018 congressional race in North Carolina. Associates of a Republican operative in that race have said that they forged witness signatures on absentee ballots, cast votes in races that voters had left blank on unsealed ballots and were paid based on the number of ballots collected. All of that would be illegal under the Democrats’ bill. In addition, the House of Representatives did not expel any Republican because of the election scandal, and it wasn’t the House itself that decided not to seat the Republican in question. Here’s what actually happened. In the US House election for North Carolina’s 9th District, Republican Mark Harris received 905 more votes than Democrat Dan McCready. Because of the allegations against Leslie McCrae Dowless, an operative for Harris who ended up getting indicted — he said he had done nothing wrong, and his trial has not occurred yet — the North Carolina State Board of Elections voted not to certify the results. The board called for a new election, which was won in 2019 by Republican Dan Bishop. (Harris declined to run in the new election.) It’s also worth noting that, according to a National Conference of State Legislatures web post in February, 26 states already permit voters to let someone else submit a ballot for them. Twelve of those states have limits on the number of ballots any one person can collect and return; the Democrats’ bill would not allow such limits. State proposals McConnell, arguing that this federal bill is unnecessary, claimed that “states are not engaging in trying to suppress voters, whatsoever.” Facts First: Since the 2020 election, Republican state legislators around the country have put forward proposals that would make it more difficult to vote. These include stricter identification requirements and reduced access to mail-in ballots, ballot drop boxes, early voting and voter registration. Here is a CNN look at what is happening. According to the Brennan Center, the legislatures with the largest number of restrictive bills as of February 19 were in Georgia, Pennsylvania and Arizona, which all flipped from electing Donald Trump in 2016 to Joe Biden in 2020. Sunday voting in Georgia Criticizing Republican election proposals in various states, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, said that “the most reprehensible effort of all might be found in Georgia, where Republicans recently passed a bill to eliminate early voting on Sunday. On Sunday, a day when many churchgoing African Americans participate in voter drives known as ‘souls to the polls.’ ” Facts First: This needs context. The current version of the Georgia Republican bill — which has not been passed into law — does not include a ban on early voting on Sundays. On March 1, however, the Georgia House did pass a Republican bill that would have reduced early Sunday voting. And before that, Georgia Republicans had initially proposed to fully eliminate early voting on Sundays. State Republicans have now backed away from these initial proposals for weekend reductions, though they are continuing to push voting restrictions of other kinds. They now appear poised to make both Saturdays of the three-week period mandatory for counties — at present, only one Saturday is mandatory — and to give counties the option of allowing early voting on both Sundays. Voting rights activists say there is an important caveat: The bill does not appear to require any weekend early voting in runoff elections. (Democrats won two Georgia runoffs in January to earn control of the US Senate.) We’ll update this item if we get further information on the bill’s runoff provisions. — CNN’s Dianne Gallagher and Kelly Mena contributed to this item. The ACLU’s position on the US bill McConnell said, “This bill is such an attack on citizens’ privacy that even the left-wing ACLU opposes this bill.” Facts First: McConnell has a solid basis for this claim: The American Civil Liberties Union publicly opposed the bill in 2019, warning, among other things, that it would unconstitutionally infringe on “the right to associational privacy.” However, it’s worth noting for context that the ACLU has since softened its stance — saying that while it continues in 2021 to have serious concerns about certain provisions of the bill, it has not “taken a public position opposing the bill” as a whole this year, spokeswoman Gabriela Meléndez Olivera said in an email. ACLU lawyers wrote in an op-ed in The Washington Post this month that they “strongly support many of the critical reforms” contained in the bill but called on legislators to fix certain other provisions. The ACLU has expressed privacy concerns about a provision that would require the disclosure of the names and addresses of people who donate $10,000 or more to entities that make “campaign-related disbursements.” The ACLU lawyers warned in the op-ed that such disbursements “could include paid political speech that discusses a public issue such as immigrants’ rights, voting rights or reproductive freedom if the communication merely mentions a candidate for public office,” and they said that groups working to advance civil rights through paid communications should not be “deterred from doing so” because of a government-imposed funding disclosure requirement. The National Disability Rights Network’s position on the bill Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, the committee chair, entered into the record three letters that she said were in support of the bill. One of them was from the National Disability Rights Network. Facts First: Klobuchar had a reasonable basis for her claim that the National Disability Rights Network supports the bill; the network sent her and the committee’s top Republican member a letter that called the bill “sorely needed” and said “almost all” of its provisions “will positively impact all voters in America, including voters with disabilities.” However, as with McConnell’s claim about the ACLU, there is nuance here. The letter also expressed “great concern” about the bill’s requirement for states to use paper ballots, saying that any such mandate would mean “this important reform legislation could disenfranchise many voters with disabilities.” (You can read more here.) Michelle Bishop, the National Disability Rights Network’s voter access and engagement manager, said in an email to CNN that the organization does not have an overall position in support of or opposition to the bill. Source link Orbem News #Bill #breaking #Check #claims #Democrats #Elections #fact #Factcheck:Breakingdown10claimsabouttheDemocrats'electionsbill-CNNPolitics #Politics

[dipulb3]

Fact check: Breaking down 10 claims about the Democrats' elections bill

New Post has been published on https://appradab.com/fact-check-breaking-down-10-claims-about-the-democrats-elections-bill/

Fact check: Breaking down 10 claims about the Democrats' elections bill

Here is a fact check of some of the claims lawmakers made at the hearing; the Republicans present made a larger number of checkable assertions about what is in the bill, so we checked more claims from them than from the Democrats present.

Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas claimed: “Under this bill, there’s automatic registration of anybody — if you get a driver’s license, if you get a welfare payment, if you get an unemployment payment, if you attend a public university. Now everyone knows there are millions of illegal aliens who have driver’s licenses, who are getting welfare benefits, who attend public universities. … ”

Facts First: It is not true that the bill automatically registers “anybody” to vote. The bill does not change current law banning people who aren’t US citizens, including undocumented immigrants, from registering to vote in federal elections. While the bill does require every state to adopt an “automatic voter registration” system, it repeatedly makes clear that only citizens are eligible to be registered.

The bill says people would have to affirm that they are US citizens before they were added to the voter rolls. It also says the government agencies involved in the registration process would inform only US citizens that they would be registered to vote unless they chose to opt out. And it says the agencies would be required to send elections officials not only people’s names but also “information showing that the individual is a citizen of the United States.”

The word “automatic” in “automatic voter registration” does not mean that there can be no verification measures. Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson testified later in the hearing that her state’s automatic voter registration system includes “six checks” to ensure that only eligible citizens get registered.

It is true that there have sometimes been errors under state automatic voter registration systems that resulted in noncitizens getting registered to vote. But there have also been errors in states without automatic voter registration. Daniel Weiner, deputy director of the Election Reform Program at New York University’s liberal Brennan Center for Justice, said in an interview that automatic voter registration “increases the accuracy” of the voter rolls, “not the other way around.”

Registration for 16-year-olds

West Virginia Secretary of State Mac Warner, a Republican, expressed concerns about the automatic voter registration provisions. Warner warned that the bill “overrules checks and balances in our election security. It mandates AVR, including 16-year-olds.”

Facts First: This needs context. While it’s true that the bill would require states to allow individuals as young as 16 to register to vote, the text explicitly says that nothing in the bill requires states to let individuals vote before they turn 18 — and that the bill has “no effect” on states’ own voting age requirements. The policy of registering people before they turn 18 but not yet allowing them to vote, known as preregistration, already exists in several states in varying forms.

According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, at least 23 states allowed individuals under 18 years old to preregister to vote as of February 2019. Fourteen states and the District of Columbia allowed preregistration at 16 years old, while four states, including West Virginia, allowed 17-year-olds to preregister. (The other five states have different age requirements.) Specifically, the West Virginia secretary of state’s website says that people who are 17 years old and will turn 18 before the next general election can register. (It also says “17 year olds may register and vote in primary elections if they turn 18 before the next general election.”)

Criminals and the vote

“This bill is designed to get criminals to vote,” Cruz said. “This bill says, ‘If you’re a murderer, if you’re a rapist, if you’re a child molester, we the Democrats want you voting.’ ”

Facts First: This needs context. The bill would not force states to allow incarcerated felons to vote. It would require states to allow people who committed felonies to vote once they are no longer incarcerated.

“Individuals who have completed a felony sentence would have their right to vote in federal elections reinstated once they are released from custody or receive a probation sentence,” Matthew Weil, director of the Elections Project at the Bipartisan Policy Center think tank, said in an email. “States would be required to notify these individuals of their re-enfranchisement.”

In a bipartisan vote on March 2, the House voted 328-97 to defeat an amendment from progressive Democrats to extend federal voting rights to people who are still incarcerated.

The prevalence of voter fraud

Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi claimed that voter fraud is “rampant.”

Facts First: This is just not true. Voter fraud is exceedingly rare in the United States. There is no evidence of widespread fraud in the 2020 general election.

Voter identification laws

Warner, the West Virginia secretary of state, said the bill “bans ID laws.”

Facts First: This is false. The bill does not prohibit states from having voter identification laws. Rather, it requires states to give voters an alternative to showing the ID the states normally require — specifically, to allow voters who do not show ID to instead submit signed statements under penalty of perjury attesting to their identity and eligibility to vote. Critics are entitled to argue that this provision weakens or undermines voter ID laws, but it’s just not true to say the bill “bans” such laws.

For absentee ballot applications in particular, the law says states can’t require any form of identification except for a signature or “similar affirmation.” It says, though, that this policy has “no effect” on ID requirements for first-time voters registering by mail. And as the National Conference of State Legislatures notes on its website, state voter ID requirements generally don’t apply to mail-in or absentee ballots anyway. “Many states allow registered voters to request an absentee ballot completely online if they are already registered to vote,” Weil said.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, made a more nuanced claim than Warner did, saying that “popular policies like voter ID requirements would be banned unless states neutered them with loopholes.” This claim at least hinted that the bill does not include a total prohibition on voter ID laws.

The bill and a North Carolina scandal

Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi said: “As I recall, a member from North Carolina, a Republican, was elected in a close election and was expelled or not seated from the House of Representatives because he engaged in ballot harvesting, which was illegal under the law of North Carolina but would be not only legal but required to be legal in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.”

Facts First: This is misleading. While the Democrats’ bill would require states to allow voters to designate other people of their choice to submit their sealed absentee ballots for them, it would not legalize the fraudulent activity that allegedly occurred in this 2018 congressional race in North Carolina. Associates of a Republican operative in that race have said that they forged witness signatures on absentee ballots, cast votes in races that voters had left blank on unsealed ballots and were paid based on the number of ballots collected. All of that would be illegal under the Democrats’ bill.

In addition, the House of Representatives did not expel any Republican because of the election scandal, and it wasn’t the House itself that decided not to seat the Republican in question. Here’s what actually happened.

In the US House election for North Carolina’s 9th District, Republican Mark Harris received 905 more votes than Democrat Dan McCready. Because of the allegations against Leslie McCrae Dowless, an operative for Harris who ended up getting indicted — he said he had done nothing wrong, and his trial has not occurred yet — the North Carolina State Board of Elections voted not to certify the results. The board called for a new election, which was won in 2019 by Republican Dan Bishop. (Harris declined to run in the new election.)

It’s also worth noting that, according to a National Conference of State Legislatures web post in February, 26 states already permit voters to let someone else submit a ballot for them. Twelve of those states have limits on the number of ballots any one person can collect and return; the Democrats’ bill would not allow such limits.

State proposals

McConnell, arguing that this federal bill is unnecessary, claimed that “states are not engaging in trying to suppress voters, whatsoever.”

Facts First: Since the 2020 election, Republican state legislators around the country have put forward proposals that would make it more difficult to vote. These include stricter identification requirements and reduced access to mail-in ballots, ballot drop boxes, early voting and voter registration.

Here is a Appradab look at what is happening. According to the Brennan Center, the legislatures with the largest number of restrictive bills as of February 19 were in Georgia, Pennsylvania and Arizona, which all flipped from electing Donald Trump in 2016 to Joe Biden in 2020.

Sunday voting in Georgia

Criticizing Republican election proposals in various states, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, said that “the most reprehensible effort of all might be found in Georgia, where Republicans recently passed a bill to eliminate early voting on Sunday. On Sunday, a day when many churchgoing African Americans participate in voter drives known as ‘souls to the polls.’ ”

Facts First: This needs context. The current version of the Georgia Republican bill — which has not been passed into law — does not include a ban on early voting on Sundays. On March 1, however, the Georgia House did pass a Republican bill that would have reduced early Sunday voting. And before that, Georgia Republicans had initially proposed to fully eliminate early voting on Sundays.

State Republicans have now backed away from these initial proposals for weekend reductions, though they are continuing to push voting restrictions of other kinds. They now appear poised to make both Saturdays of the three-week period mandatory for counties — at present, only one Saturday is mandatory — and to give counties the option of allowing early voting on both Sundays.

Voting rights activists say there is an important caveat: The bill does not appear to require any weekend early voting in runoff elections. (Democrats won two Georgia runoffs in January to earn control of the US Senate.) We’ll update this item if we get further information on the bill’s runoff provisions.

— Appradab’s Dianne Gallagher and Kelly Mena contributed to this item.

The ACLU’s position on the US bill

McConnell said, “This bill is such an attack on citizens’ privacy that even the left-wing ACLU opposes this bill.”

Facts First: McConnell has a solid basis for this claim: The American Civil Liberties Union publicly opposed the bill in 2019, warning, among other things, that it would unconstitutionally infringe on “the right to associational privacy.” However, it’s worth noting for context that the ACLU has since softened its stance — saying that while it continues in 2021 to have serious concerns about certain provisions of the bill, it has not “taken a public position opposing the bill” as a whole this year, spokeswoman Gabriela Meléndez Olivera said in an email. ACLU lawyers wrote in an op-ed in The Washington Post this month that they “strongly support many of the critical reforms” contained in the bill but called on legislators to fix certain other provisions.

The ACLU has expressed privacy concerns about a provision that would require the disclosure of the names and addresses of people who donate $10,000 or more to entities that make “campaign-related disbursements.” The ACLU lawyers warned in the op-ed that such disbursements “could include paid political speech that discusses a public issue such as immigrants’ rights, voting rights or reproductive freedom if the communication merely mentions a candidate for public office,” and they said that groups working to advance civil rights through paid communications should not be “deterred from doing so” because of a government-imposed funding disclosure requirement.

The National Disability Rights Network’s position on the bill

Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, the committee chair, entered into the record three letters that she said were in support of the bill. One of them was from the National Disability Rights Network.

Facts First: Klobuchar had a reasonable basis for her claim that the National Disability Rights Network supports the bill; the network sent her and the committee’s top Republican member a letter that called the bill “sorely needed” and said “almost all” of its provisions “will positively impact all voters in America, including voters with disabilities.” However, as with McConnell’s claim about the ACLU, there is nuance here.

The letter also expressed “great concern” about the bill’s requirement for states to use paper ballots, saying that any such mandate would mean “this important reform legislation could disenfranchise many voters with disabilities.” (You can read more here.) Michelle Bishop, the National Disability Rights Network’s voter access and engagement manager, said in an email to Appradab that the organization does not have an overall position in support of or opposition to the bill.

[prelawland]

How Does Voter Suppression Affect Modern Elections?

By Hannah Holmes, University Of Chicago Class of 2023

July 17, 2020

Voter suppression, generally thought of as a relic of the Jim Crow era, might not be as distant and obsolete as it seems.  Suppression has evolved past poll taxes, literacy tests, and grandfather clauses into photo ID laws, short preregistration periods, and reduced numbers of polling locations.  Though more subtle, modern voter suppression still tends to disproportionately affect minority groups.  As Americans devote more of their attention to election coverage and the importance of voting is elevated, suppression becomes more easily identifiable and efforts against it become more determined. 

For full article please visit

Modern Voter Suppression In The United States

at

Illinois PreLaw Land

[illionoisprelawland-blog]

Modern Voter Suppression In The United States

By Hannah Holmes, University Of Chicago Class of 2023

July 17, 2020

When most people think of voter suppression, their minds jump to the Jim Crow laws of the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries.  Voter suppression at the time consisted of poll taxes, literacy tests, and grandfather clauses, all intended to limit the influence of African-American voters.  These tactics are not limited to the past, however, according to the article “Rule by Violence, Rule by Law: Lynching, Jim Crow, and the Continuing Evolution of Voter Suppression in the U.S.”: “...attempts to restrict voting by blacks and other groups have increased in recent years.  Like the post-Reconstruction South, partisan calculations about how voting by different groups affects election victories drive attempts at suppression” [i].   Given the illegality of classic Jim Crow suppression techniques, modern voter suppression is different than it was; it does not directly constrain certain groups of voters and is somewhat harder to detect.  Researchers Quan Li, Michael Pomantell, and Scot Schraufnagel (from Northern Illinois University) devised a system to quantify voter suppression, called the Cost of Voting Index (COVI).  Each state’s score is calculated according to seven issue areas: registration deadline, voter registration restrictions (such as the exclusion of felons or the absence of online registration), registration drive requirements (such as state certification), preregistration laws (such as allowance of only those over 17 to preregister), voting inconvenience (such as the absence of early voting or reduced polling locations), voter ID laws (such as a strict requirement for a photo ID), and poll hours. 

The higher a state’s score, the more difficult it is for voters in that state to vote.  For example, states that have a registration deadline long before the election, exclude felons, require certification for registration drives, only allow 17-year-olds to pregister, have few polling locations, require photo IDs, and have short poll hours have higher scores than states with fewer (or looser) restrictions and regulations.  Based on this system, the five hardest states to vote in as of 2016 were Mississippi, Virginia, Tennessee, Indiana, and Texas, while the five easiest states to vote in were Oregon, Colorado, California, North Dakota, and Iowa [ii]. Mississippi has long been scrutinized for its unusual voting process in state elections, which is similar to the electoral college.  In order for a candidate to win, they must win a majority of the popular vote and a majority of Mississippi’s 122 state House districts.  According to Section 141 of the Mississippi Constitution of 1890, if no candidate receives a majority of both the popular vote and the electoral vote, “...then the House of Representatives shall proceed to choose a governor from the two persons who shall have received the highest number of popular votes” [iii].  If a candidate wins only the popular vote and not a majority of the state’s House districts (or vice versa), then the election is decided by the state’s House of Representatives.  Gerrymandering in Mississippi makes it disproportionately difficult for a Democrat candidate to win district support, increasing the likelihood that an election will be decided by the House of Representatives.  This tends to unfairly negate the power of African-American voters, of whom 76% are Democrats or lean Democratic, compared to only 22% of white voters [iv].  Proposed House Concurrent Resolution 47 would eliminate this loophole by declaring that “if no person receives a majority of the votes, then a runoff election shall be held as provided by general law...” [v]. Thirty-six states (including Mississippi) require or request some form of identification in order to vote, generally under the pretense of curbing voter fraud [vi]. 

The Brennan Center reports that 25% of black U.S. citizens over the age of 18 have no government-issued photo ID, compared to 8% of white citizens over the age of 18 [vii]. NPR reports that states that specifically require driver’s licenses are the most suppressive.  The elderly, young people, and the poor are not likely to have a license and it can be difficult to obtain a qualified non-driver’s license ID.  A birth certificate is also sometimes required to obtain an ID, but an ID is sometimes required to obtain a birth certificate, creating a catch-22 situation [viii]. Proponents of ID laws argue that the potential suppression is worthwhile because it is scarified for voter security and the prevention of fraud, but there is little evidence to suggest that voter fraud is really a substantial problem in need of attention.  A study of voter fraud in the 2016 General Election found no evidence corroborating claims of wide fraud: “Our empirical results share a common theme: they are inconsistent with fraud allegations made by Trump.  The results are, however, consistent with various state-level investigations conducted in the initial months of 2017, all of which have failed to find any evidence of widespread voter fraud in the 2016 General Election” [ix].  Research conducted by News21 also failed to find evidence of widespread fraud: “...News21 reporters sent thousands of requests to elections officers in all 50 states, asking for every case of fraudulent activity...Analysis of the resulting comprehensive News21 election fraud database turned up 10 cases of voter impersonation. 

With 146 million registered voters in the United States during that time, those 10 cases represent one out of about every 15 million prospective voters” [x].  Although not included in the top five most difficult states to vote in reported by the previously mentioned study, Georgia’s voter suppression has been somewhat more publicly-known and discussed than suppression in other states; namely, the election of Brian Kemp as governor and the loss of Stacey Abrams.  Georgia’s HB 268, passed in 2017, established what is known as “exact match” law.  Under the law, voter applications “shall be rejected if the Georgia driver’s license number, identification card number of an identification card..., or last four digits of the social security number provided by the applicant is not verified and the applicant fails to provide sufficient evidence to the board of registrars or to verify the applicant’s identity within 26 months  following the date of the application” [xi]. In a motion filed by the Georgia Coalition for the People’s Agenda et al. against Governor Brian Kemp, who was Georgia Secretary of State at the time of the law’s passing, the legality and necessity of the law was questioned. 

According to the lawsuit, even small discrepancies can disqualify a voter: “...the transposition of a single letter or number, deletion or addition of a hyphen or apostrophe, the accidental entry of an extra character or space, and the use of a familiar name like ‘Tom’ instead of ‘Thomas’ will cause a no match result” [xii].  Furthermore, no review is made of information entered into the state’s registration system, so a voter may be put under review even if they provided accurate information.  The “exact match” law also seems to have disproportionately affected black voters.  According to the lawsuit, “approximately 51,111 voter registration applications were in ‘pending’ status for reasons related to the ‘exact match’ protocol...Approximately 80.15% of those pending applications were submitted by African American, Latino, and Asian-American applicants.”  The U.S. Census Bureau reports that 52% of Georgia is white (non-Hispanic or Latino) [xiii].  In 2018, U.S. District Judge Eleanor Ross ruled that “exact match” laws “burden the constitutional right of individuals flagged and placed into pending status due to citizenship more than is necessary” [xiv]. HB 268 was largely eliminated by HB 316, passed in 2019 [xv].

________________________________________________________________

[i] Epperly, B., Witko, C., Strickler, R., & White, P. (2019, March 25). Rule by Violence, Rule by Law: Lynching, Jim Crow, and the Continuing Evolution of Voter Suppression in the U.S. Retrieved July 12, 2020, from https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/rule-by-violence-rule-by-law-lynching-jim-crow-and-the-continuing-evolution-of-voter-suppression-in-the-us/CBC6AD86B557A093D7E832F8D821978B/core-reader

[ii] Li, Q., Pomantell, M. J., & Schraufnagel, S. (2018, September 18). Cost of Voting in the American States. Retrieved July 9, 2020, from https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/10.1089/elj.2017.0478

[iii] Miss. Const. Art. 5, Sec. 141 [iv] Party Affiliation Among Adults in Mississippi by Race/Ethnicity. (2018, September 19). Retrieved July 13, 2020, from https://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/compare/party-affiliation/by/racial-and-ethnic-composition/among/state/mississippi/

[v] Mississippi Legislature House Concurrent Resolution 47. (2020). Retrieved July 9, 2020, from http://billstatus.ls.state.ms.us/2020/pdf/history/HC/HC0047.xml

[vi] Underhill, W. (2020, July 9). Voter Identification Requirements: Voter ID Laws. Retrieved July 13, 2020, from https://www.ncsl.org/research/elections-and-campaigns/voter-id.aspx

[vii] Citizens Without Proof: A Survey of Americans' Possession of Documentary Proof of Citizenship and Photo Identification(Rep.). (2006). New York City, New York: Brennan Center for Justice.

[viii] Dade, C. (2012, January 28). Why New Photo ID Laws Mean Some Won't Vote. Retrieved July 8, 2020, from https://www.npr.org/2012/01/28/146006217/why-new-photo-id-laws-mean-some-wont-vote

[ix] Cottrell, D., Herron, M. C., & Westwood, S. J. (2017). An Exploration of Donald Trump's Allegations of Massive Voter Fraud in the 2016 General Election (Rep.). Elsevier.

[x] Khan, N., & Carson, C. (2012, August 12). Comprehensive Database of U.S. Voter Fraud Uncovers No Evidence That Photo ID Is Needed. Retrieved July 13, 2020, from https://votingrights.news21.com/article/election-fraud/

[xi] Georgia General Assemby HB 268. (2017). Retrieved July 13, 2020, from http://www.legis.ga.gov/Legislation/en-US/display/20172018/HB/268

[xii] Georgia Coalition for the People's Agenda et al. v. Brian Kemp (U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, Atlanta Division October 11, 2018) (Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, Dist. file).

[xiii] U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts: Georgia. (n.d.). Retrieved July 13, 2020, from https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/GA

[xiv] Georgia Coalition for the People's Agenda et al. v. Brian Kemp (U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, Atlanta Division November 2, 2018) (Courthouse News, Dist. file). [

xv] Georgia General Assembly HB 316. (2019). Retrieved July 13, 2020, from http://www.legis.ga.gov/legislation/en-US/Display/20192020/HB/316

[nationalvoterregistrationday]

Pre-registration allows soon-to-be-voters to register before they turn 18. If you pre-register now, you’ll be notified on your 18th birthday that your voter registration has been automatically activated.

[dendroica]

The Supreme Court on Monday announced that it would stay out of a fight over a restrictive North Carolina voting law. The move left in place a federal appeals court ruling that struck down key parts of the law as an unconstitutional effort to “target African Americans with almost surgical precision.” As is the court’s custom, the justices gave no reason for declining to hear the case. But Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. issued a statement noting that there was a dispute about who represented the state in the case and that nothing should be read into the court’s decision to decline to hear it. The law, enacted by the state’s Republican-controlled Legislature in 2013, imposed an array of voting restrictions, including new voter identification requirements. It was part of a wave of voting restrictions enacted after a 5-to-4 Supreme Court decision that effectively struck down a central part of the federal Voting Rights Act, weakening federal oversight of voting rights. The case challenging the North Carolina law was brought by civil rights groups and the Obama administration. A trial judge rejected arguments that the law violated the Constitution and what remained of the Voting Rights Act. A three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, in Richmond, Va., disagreed.  The appeals court ruling struck down five parts of the law: its voter ID requirements, a rollback of early voting to 10 days from 17, an elimination of same-day registration and of preregistration of some teenagers, and its ban on counting votes cast in the wrong precinct. The court found that all five restrictions “disproportionately affected African-Americans.” The law’s voter identification provision, for instance, “retained only those types of photo ID disproportionately held by whites and excluded those disproportionately held by African-Americans.” That was the case, the court said, even though the state had “failed to identify even a single individual who has ever been charged with committing in-person voter fraud in North Carolina.” But it did find that there was evidence of fraud in absentee voting by mail, a method used disproportionately by white voters. The Legislature, however, exempted absentee voting from the photo ID requirement.

Strict North Carolina Voter ID Law Thwarted After Supreme Court Rejects Case - The New York Times

[nntodayblog]

More Than 100,000 California Teenagers Are Now Preregistered To Vote

1.8k

Over 100,000 16- and 17-year-olds in California are now preregistered to vote, the state’s Secretary of State Alex Padilla announced on Friday.

Roughly 38 percent of those teenagers registered as Democrat, and 10 percent registered as Republican, with a smattering of other party affiliations represented, according to data released by Padilla’s office. The greatest percentage ― just over 43 percent ― registered with no party preference.

The achievement comes amid a nationwide tide of youth activism over gun control and marks the outcome of recent efforts in the state to increase civic engagement among youth.

“We are seeing the impact that young people can have when they stand up and engage,” Padilla said in a statement. “Since California launched pre-registration, 100,000 soon-to-be voters have answered the call to participate in their democracy. As Secretary of State, I want to do all we can to encourage civic engagement among our youth.”

The state also plans to launch a new web portal that further encourages youth participation, Padilla added. This includes guiding users where to find the nearest mock elections, poll volunteer sign-ups and high school voter education events. He also unveiled a new voter registration card, which his office said was “cleaner, better organized and uses plain language.”

Introducing California’s new voter registration card. It’s cleaner, better organized and uses plain language. The new voter registration cards are now available at the Secretary of State’s office and have been shipped to county elections officials throughout the state. pic.twitter.com/ohaBrVoeJ6

— CA SOS Vote (@CASOSvote) April 5, 2018

Young voters across the country consistently have some of the lowest election turnouts of any age bracket, and some studies have shown preregistration can help boost their numbers. One 2014Duke University study found that states that have introduced preregistration laws typically see an increase of youth voter turnout by an average of 2 to 13 percentage points.

California is one of 13 U.S. states, along with the District of Columbia, that allow citizens as young as 16 years old to preregister to vote, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. This preregistration process allows youth to become automatically eligible to vote when they turn 18.

The state passed legislation in 2015 to which establish procedures that can submit voter registration simultaneously with the application for or renewal of a driver’s license. In February, Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law a bill that expands that measure by automatically preregistering all eligible 16- and 17-year-olds in California when they receive a driver’s license or state ID that law will go into effect in January 2019.

For those preregistered today, anyone who will turn 18 in the next few months will likely be able to vote in a swath of upcoming state and midterm elections.

On the ballot in 2018 are the California governorship, U.S. Senate and House seats, as well as state Senate, Assembly and Supreme Court positions.

“There is no doubt in our minds that young people across California are ready to take their power to the polls,” said Luis Sanchez, co-executive director of civic engagement groups Mobilize the Immigrant Vote and Yvote, in a release. “We support these courageous young people and stand ready to flex their collective power at the polls in 2018 and beyond.”

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Antonia Blumberg

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