Two of the hundreds of black and white Freedom Summer activists who traveled to
Mississippi in 1964 register a black voter at her home.
This week in the war on voting is a joint project of Joan McCarter and Meteor Blades.
• Foes of Wisconsin voter ID law file for repeal of federal judges' ruling: A three-judge panel of the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Sept. 12 that Wisconsin's strict voter ID law should be implemented for the November elections. While that decision is "temporary," the court is working on a final decision. But since the judges, all appointed by Republican presidents, took the stance they did, close observers believe it's nearly certain that the appeals court will rule in favor of the law when it makes its permanent decision in the matter.
Opponents of the decision are seeking an immediate review of the panel's ruling by the full 10-member 7th Circuit Court. In a filing Sept. 16 and 17 by the Advancement Project and the American Civil Liberties Union said the ruling was "radical, last-minute change to procedures for conducting an election that is already underway." The attorneys wrote "Supreme Court precedent and other circuits uniformly caution against such eleventh-hour changes to the election laws, even where those courts have approved such changes for future elections."
Rick Hasen of the highly respected Election Law Blog said it is rare for a full appeals court to take on a case, although he added in an email to the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel that the ACLU makes a compelling argument that "changing the rules so close to the election risks chaos."
• Senator Gillibrand introduces Voter Registration Modernization Act: The New York Democrat's bill, together with the House version introduced by Rep. John Lewis, is based on a proposal developed at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University. It would "provide national standards for secure and accessible online registration and help bring America’s election system into the 21st century."
You can read a statement from the Brennan Center in support of the bill here.
The current broken, obsolete registration system is, in great part, what's at fault for long lines and voter frustration on Election Day. Online registration is a remedy for many of the problems. Already available in 24 states, the proposal is designed to increase citizen participation and the efficiency and accuracy of registration. Brennan estimates that if the act passed, it would add 50 million to the voter rolls, while reducing registration costs and making fraud less likely.
There is more on the war on voting below the orange butterfly ballot.
• ProPublica has posted an excellent state-by-state update on what's happened since the Supreme Court wrecked the Voting Rights Act in June 2013:
Several states—such as Texas, North Carolina and Ohio—are facing legal challenges to new restrictions around voter ID, early voting or same-day registration.
Meanwhile, some have moved to loosen voter restrictions. Oregon and Florida have dropped out of the Interstate Cross-Check Program, an effort to purge duplicate voter registrations from voter rolls in different states. Also, as of June 2014, online voter registration has been made available in 20 states.
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Spencer Woodman asks why Georgia keeps going after black voters:
On Wednesday, the State of Georgia suffered a major defeat in its four-year odyssey to win fraud convictions against twelve African American voting organizers in the small town of Quitman. After a grueling five-week trial (and two previous mistrials), a jury cleared the state’s key target, Lula Smart, of all counts of voter fraud. In 2010, Georgia agents arrested and briefly incarcerated Smart and the Quitman group just weeks after they had led an unprecedented surge in the black community’s voting participation, ushering in the first-ever black majority on the local school board. The state has since failed miserably to provide evidence supporting the charges.
The defeat comes as Georgia’s Republican Secretary of State, Brian Kemp, has begun aggressively pursuing another, larger-scale version of the Quitman case. The new investigation, uncovered just last week, targets a massive new voter registration project led by some of the state’s most prominent African Americans. Kemp’s move has revived worries that Republicans in Georgia are raising the specter of voter fraud to cast a pall of criminality on groups that register minorities. And the stakes are high: Democrats say the state’s unregistered 700,000 black voters could turn Georgia into a genuine battleground that’s more competitive in national elections. Kemp’s latest target, the New Georgia Project, has led this effort with eye-popping registration totals statewide. Kemp himself was recently caught candidly saying such efforts could spell doom for Republicans.
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Less than 1 percent of voter registration forms turned in by Georgia group accused of fraud are actually fraudulent:
There were 25 confirmed forgeries found in voter registration documents, Jared Thomas, spokesman for Secretary of State Brian Kemp (R), told The Washington Post. That’s out of more than 85,000 voter registration forms turned in by the New Georgia Project and Third Sector Development.
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Bloomberg editors: Voter ID Is Bad for Republicans, Too:
A political party that is more eager to restrict votes than encourage them is a danger not only to the democratic system but also, in the long run, to itself.
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Federal judge: Sandoval County, New Mexico, Democratic officials deprived voters of the chance to cast ballots:
There were problems administering the election in Rio Rancho, which resulted in voters standing in long lines and waiting in some instances for more than five hours to exercise their right to vote, according to the order by District Judge William P. Johnson. [...]
The judge’s order states that the county “no longer has discretion to change the location or amount of polling centers without an order approving such change by a state district judge.”
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NC NAACP files complaint over misleading Republican ad on voter ID law: The TV and Internet ad for North Carolina Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger makes it seem as if the voter ID law is in place for the November election. However, the law, which also ends same-day registration, straight-ticket voting and out-of-precinct voting on election day, doesn't go into effect until 2016.
The ad:
You need a photo ID to drive, cash a check, even to buy medicine. Shouldn't you show a photo ID to vote? Liberals like Obama and Kay Hagan say no. Phil Berger fought the liberals and won. Now, thanks to Phil Berger, voters must show a valid photo ID to vote.
But not this year. Critics view the ad as an attempt to suppress the vote this November. During a Sept. 16 press conference, the Rev. William Barber, president of the NC NAACP, said: "It's not liberal. It's not conservative. It's a lie." His organization wants Berger to run a corrective ad.
• Colorado's all-mail election shifts Democratic strategy: Colorado is a battleground state this year, with the Senate seat of Democrat Mark Udall the biggest prize. Every registered voter is receiving a ballot in the mail. Those who have failed to register can do so on election day.
“We’re organized on the ground. We’re going to have the most focused, disciplined and well-resourced organizing campaign in the history of an off-year election,” Udall said in an interview. The all-mail election format “gives us a tool to monitor who’s voting and who hasn’t voted, and focus on both persuasion and getting out the vote.” Registered voters identified as likely supporters of a given candidate will hear from that candidate’s campaign—endlessly, incessantly, by phone and in person—until they send back their ballots. Once a county elections office reports receiving a voter’s ballot, the door knocks will stop, and the phone will fall silent.