Some of the Republican-authored bills that tighten voting identification and registration requirements muscled their way through the General Assembly on Tuesday, bound for the desk of Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell. Del. Mark Cole’s bill would eliminate several forms of acceptable voter ID approved just one year ago — utility bills, bank statements, a government check. It won final passage on a largely party-line 64-36 House vote. The measure would not take effect until 2014, however, because of a Senate amendment that the House accepted. The measure to which Democrats most object, a requirement that voters present photo identification at the polls, awaits House passage as early as Wednesday. So does a Republican Sen. Mark Obenshain’s bill requiring voter registration lists to be checked against federal immigration lists to identify non-citizens. House Republicans have unabashedly advanced several measures tightening voting requirements this year while simultaneously rejecting legislation that would have lowered some barriers to voting and reduced waiting lines up to four hours at some precincts last fall.
Among them were Democratic and Republican bills that would have expanded no-excuses absentee voting for people 65 and older, allowing them to cast ballots before election day and reducing the number of elderly voters who use curbside voting. Local election officials pushed for the change to reduce the number of elderly voters that now vote curbside, something that significantly slows voting and lengthens waiting lines on election day.
Democrats accuse Republicans of trying to legislatively rig the system this winter to achieve what they could not last November at the polls when President Barack Obama became the first Democrat since Franklin Roosevelt to carry Virginia twice in a row in a presidential race.
Republicans say the bills are targeted at voter fraud.
The Senate and House both approved legislation requiring training for groups conducting voter registration drives. But the legislation heads to a conference committee after a sharply divided Senate added a couple of amendments over the objections of the bill’s Republican supporters.
Full Article: Republican voter identification restrictions on way to governor; photo ID mandate next on deck – The Washington Post.