Last month, I attended the California GOP summer convention here in LA in hopes of getting some inside info, perhaps a trade secret or two reserved for those on the inside. I know, shudder the thought, but let's just say I spent a weekend with Republicans so you don't have to.
One of the most telling revelations came during an "election integrity" panel held by the The Republican National Lawyers Association. When I saw it listed on the convention agenda, I did a double take. Republicans concerned with voter integrity? Ha! Winning elections is what they do. If there's any voter fraud, it's working in their favor, right? Well, the thing is, voter integrity is not a defensive issue for them. While we're fretting about Diebold, Republicans are on the offense all over the country. The focus of the war they're waging, as most of you are well aware, is passing legislation that requires people to show a valid photo ID in order to vote.
This has been a fight at both the state and federal levels with Republicans asserting that such measures are necessary to reduce voter fraud and Democrats asserting that the laws disenfranchise seniors, minorities, students and others who, conveniently for the Republican supporters of such laws, tend to vote Democratic.
The LA Times ran a good article last week on the current state of the voter ID battle.
Republicans had great success enacting new laws after 2004, winning voter identification requirements in Georgia, Ohio, Indiana, Missouri and the city of Albuquerque as well as ... adding the voter registration restrictions in Ohio and Florida.
In addition to an Arizona law that
had been approved by Republican lawmakers and vetoed by Arizona's Democratic governor before conservative activists included it as part of a broad anti-immigration initiative passed by voters in 2004.
As Dan Tokaji, an Ohio State University law professor who publishes the election-law blog Equal Vote, says:
"With voter ID and registration, this is where the current battles over election practices are now being fought."
Here's a rundown of the current status of laws in various states and their respective court challenges.
State: Arizona
Action: Proposition 200, approved by voters in 2004, requires proof of U.S. citizenship when registering and identification when casting ballots.
Result: Voting provisions are being challenged in federal court.
State: Missouri
Action: A new law requires voters to present photo ID. Voters without an ID can use a provisional ballot until 2008, when only seniors, the disabled or those with religious objections to obtaining a photo ID will be allowed to cast provisional ballots.
Result: The law is being challenged in state and federal courts.
*a judge struck down the Missouri law just last Thursday ruling it unconstitutional.
State: Georgia
Action: Republicans have tried to require photo IDs at the polls. A 2005 law was ruled unconstitutional becaue of the difficulty and cost of obtaining an ID. A new law passed this year makes free IDs available, with some restrictions.
Result: A judge temporarily halted the law before elections in July. Litigation is pending.
UPDATEJudge ruled against the law yesterday, again, calling it unconstitutional.
State: Ohio
Action: A new rule set criminal penalties for violating voter registration policies. Critics said this placed a punitive burden on organizations that register voters.
Result: Struck down by a federal judge.
State: Florida
Action: GOP-dominated Legislature passed a law imposing steep fines on voter registration organizations that violate guidelines.
Result: A federal judge blocked enforcement.
State: Indiana
Action: A law passed last year requires most voters to present a state-issued photo ID at the polls. The law was challenged by the Democratic Party and other interest groups.
Result: A federal judge ruled in April that opponents failed to prove it was too burdensome.
State: New Mexico
Action: Last year Albuquerque voters approved an amendment to the city's election law requiring a photo ID when voting in person.
Result: Challenged by the ACLU in federal court.
State: Wisconsin
Action: The GOP-led Legislature has repeatedly approved laws requiring a photo ID to vote, but the bills have been vetoed by Democratic Gov. James Doyle.
Result: Republicans are seeking a state constitutional amendment.
So far, Democrats have united against these laws and courts are largely finding them unacceptable as well. Which brings me back to the GOP summer convention. Panelist Roman Buhler spelled out the Republican strategy in one creepy phrase: "slicing the salami thinly."
In other words, instead of shooting for an absolute voter ID requirement overnight, they will seek to chip away at it slowly by pushing legislation that Democrats would have a hard time opposing and that courts would have a hard time overturning, such as a voter ID requirement with an exception -- if you don't have an ID you would still be able to vote as long as you signed an affidavit promising that you are who you claim to be -- a signature bypass he called it. "I don't see how Democrats could vote against that!" he exclaimed.
Hmm, that sounds suspiciously like the voter ID bill that the House is considering this week (a vote is expected on Wednesday), whose title inspires the same double take as the panel I attended:
H.R. 4844 - Federal Election Integrity Act of 2006.
Salon is on it.
Under the Republican proposal, all American voters will have to present valid government-issued photo identifications to vote in federal elections beginning in 2008. If voters do not have an I.D. handy on Election Day, they can cast a provisional ballot, but the ballot will be counted only if an actual photo I.D. is produced within 48 hours. The bill also provides federal money to provide free identification cards to any citizen who cannot afford the typical government processing fees.
Sounds benign enough. But Dan Tokaji calls it what it is:
While I try to use such forceful terms as "vote suppression"with great care, there is no other way to describe a bill that would prevent people from registering or voting unless they present documents that many do not have. In order to register, voters would be required to produce proof of U.S. citizenship, notwithstanding the fact that there is no single document that proves citizenship. Voters would also be required to produce "current and valid photo identification," something that many people also don't have. In Wisconsin, for example, only 22% of black males between 18- 24 had a driver's license.
He's particularly disturbed by the lack of evidence that such a bill is even needed.
At the hearing on the bill that I attended back in June, the most that proponents could assert is that 35 foreign nationals attempted to register -- some of them people who had applied for, but not yet obtained, American citizenship -- in Harris County, Texas, a jurisdiction with some 1.9 million voters. This amounts to one ineligible voter registered for every 54,285 eligible voters. By contrast, the available evidence suggests that about 6-10% of voters lack photo ID, and that a disproportionate number of them are elderly, disabled, minority, and poor people.
The LA Times article details a particularly poignant example of the sort of disenfranchisement we're looking at if this bill passes - the very sort of disenfranchisement that is happening in Arizona as we speak.
[Navajo] leader, Leonard Gorman, testified that many Navajo who spend their lives herding sheep in remote areas cannot fulfill the new requirements because they do not drive, nor do they have mailboxes or even the utility bills that are accepted as alternative forms of identification under the new law.
"This is very burdensome to the elders," Gorman told U.S. District Judge Roslyn Silver.
...
Gorman was describing a highly localized, narrow slice of the electorate -- about 60,000 voting-age adults living on the reservation. But Native Americans tend to vote for Democrats.
60,000 potentially disenfranchised voters. Remember that Bush won adjacent New Mexico in 2004 by just 6,000 votes.
Dan Tokaji anticipates that this bill will pass the House, but a friend of mine on the Hill tells me there isn't even a companion bill for it in the Senate yet. In fact, he doesn't think it's even something the Senate would "bother with." Which begs the question, why is the House even considering it? Salon nails it.
The voter I.D. issue also has the advantage of appealing to conservative voter anger over illegal immigration...
Following this script, Republicans are sure to focus the debate...on the issue of immigration. A vote against the bill, Republicans will likely charge, is a vote in favor of ballot fraud.
More from Tokaji:
What seems to be fueling this bill is not voter fraud at all, but a mixture of political gamesmanship and immigrant-bashing. It is no surprise, then, that citizen groups are steadfastly opposed to the bill, including the League of Women Voters and Leadership Conference on Civil Rights. The Leadership Conference's letter to Congress highlights how ironic it would be for the House, less than two months after reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act, to enact a bill suppressing voting rights. As they put it:
The requirement that all voters present a photo ID before being able to cast a regular ballot will disproportionately disenfranchise people of color, the elderly, individuals with disabilities, rural and Native voters, the homeless, low-income people, and married women, who are less likely to carry a photo ID. Photo ID requirements also build an enormous amount of discretion into the balloting process, thus creating opportunities for discrimination at the polls against racial, ethnic, and language minority voters.
Even if there's no possibility of its becoming law, Democrats must be unified against this bill. Call your member of Congress, hell, call all members of Congress, and urge them to oppose H.R. 4844. If we're not careful, this bill will be the first of several down a slippery slope toward mass disenfranchisement.
Update [2006-9-19 20:18:24 by ollieb]: commenter Kujo AAR notes the true intent of the bill being considered in the House is not to require merely photo ID but actually ID that proves citizenship.
the exact wording from the resolution:
shall require the applicant to provide a photographic copy of any document which provides proof that the applicant is a citizen of the United States, in accordance with guidelines established by the Election Administration Commission in consultation with the Secretary of Homeland Security and the Secretary of State.'.
Neither a driver's license nor a social security card accomplishes this requirement.
According to opendna, only a passport, Naturalization Certificate or Certificate of Citizenship will do the trick.
(cross-posted at The Courage Campaign)