Editorials: Election Reform Should Be a Top Priority for New Congress | The Nation

On two major occasions – during his election night speech and second inaugural address – President Obama has highlighted the need for election reform. “By the way, we have to fix that,” he said on November 6 about the long lines at the polls in states like Florida. Shortly thereafter, the cause of election reform seemed to fall by the wayside, with more pressing events, such as the Sandy Hook shooting and the fiscal cliff, dominating the news. But Obama returned to the issue on January 21, saying “our journey is not complete until no citizen is forced to wait for hours to exercise the right to vote.” Now the question is whether the Obama administration and Congress will actually do something to fix the shameful way US elections are run. There are smart proposals in Congress to address the issue. The most comprehensive among them is the Voter Empowerment Act, reintroduced today by Democratic leaders in the House, including civil rights icon John Lewis, and Kirsten Gillibrand in Senate.

Voting Blogs: Governor McDonnell Should Veto Virginia’s GOP Redistricting Gambit | Brennan Center for Justice

The 20-20 divided Virginia Senate took extraordinary action to drastically rewrite the district lines for 45 percent of Virginia’s residents on Inauguration Day.  On January 21, 2013, State Senator Henry March—a Civil Rights Activist—left the state to attend the inauguration of President Barack Obama. The Virginia Senate quickly moved to take advantage of his absence and introduced, amended and passed an amendment to a House bill making technical changes to the 2011 redistricting lines. By the time the temporarily Republican-controlled Senate was done with the technical fixes presented by the House, it had fully rewritten a number of senate districts—displacing almost 2 million Virginia residents into new districts.  While the current Senate is evenly split with 20 Democrats and 20 Republicans, some estimates suggest that the newly-proposed lines might result in a far more lopsided chamber even though there has been no significant change in the makeup of VA’s electorate in the 19 months since the previous lines were approved. The proposal could put Republicans in position to win 27 seats in the Senate at the next election, which would give Republicans a veto-proof supermajority in the chamber. This bill, as amended, passed on a party-line vote, 20 to 19, with Sen. March absent.

Voting Blogs: Tying Presidential Electors to Gerrymandered Congressional Districts will Sabotage Elections | Brennan Center for Justice

Recently Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Virginia introduced legislation to make the distribution of electoral votes for president dependent on the votes in each congressional districts instead of statewide results. Legislation to that effect has been introduced in Michigan, Wisconsin, andVirginia, and there are serious discussions in Pennsylvania. Legislators in states like Florida and Ohio also may introduce similar legislation. Currently, only Maine and Nebraska (a state with a unicameral, bipartisan legislature) allocate their electoral votes in a similar fashion. Most critics of this plan identify it as a scheme by the GOP to rig the election to improve its chances to elect a president. But there are a number of reasons to object to this proposal beyond its partisan intent or impact. Significantly, it would import into the presidential election process the dysfunction that plagues the congressional districting process. The problems with redistricting include not only partisan gerrymandering but also citizen exclusion from the redistricting process, imbalanced districts based on prison-based gerrymandering, and chronic problems with Census undercounts.

Voting Blogs: Colorado Victory: Judge Rules for Voting Rights | Brennan Center for Justice

The voting rights of thousands of Colorado citizens were protected today as a state district court judge blocked Secretary of State Scott Gessler’s controversial interpretation of Colorado’s mail ballot election law. Under Sec. Gessler’s reading of the law, county clerks could not mail ballots in elections conducted only by mail to voters who did not vote in the most recent general election. In effect, thousands of eligible voters — including many longtime voters — would not be able to vote unless they jumped through new and burdensome hurdles. Colorado election law gives counties the option of conducting certain elections by mail. In these elections, there are no traditional polling places; instead, citizens vote by mailing in ballots sent to them by county election administrators. Just before the November 2011 election, Sec. Gessler issued an order prohibiting counties from mailing ballots to voters who did not vote in the last general election (2010). These voters, so called “inactive-failed to vote” voters, could only be sent mail ballots if they submitted to a confusing and burdensome administrative process to “reactivate” their status by effectively re-registering to vote.

Voting Blogs: Voting Rights Cannot Be Ignored | Brennan Center for Justice

A new year means new opportunities. It is 2013, and our democracy should not have to suffer through another cycle of rancorous, partisan, and business-as-usual politics — there is too much we need to fix. In Virginia, Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell already seized the opportunity of a new legislative cycle to support wide scale voting rights restoration for people with past criminal convictions. Yet, Virginia legislators squandered the chance to move beyond partisanship by voting against restoring rights. Virginia is one of only four states in the nation that permanently disenfranchises those with past criminal convictions unless they individually apply to the governor to have their rights restored.

National: Voter ID battle set to rage again | NJ.com

The national battle over voter ID laws that roiled the presidential campaign for a time then fizzled before Election Day is set to rage again in 2013. This year promises a flurry of new voter ID legislation across the country as well as reignited court battles in states where the laws were blocked last year and a Supreme Court ruling on part of the Voting Rights Act. All of the activity will bring the debate — which pits conservatives targeting potential election fraud against voting-rights groups convinced the laws are really about disenfranchising low-propensity liberal voters — to the forefront again. “There are a number of states where there’s clearly active legislative attempts to make their voter ID laws more restrictive,” said Wendy Weiser, director of the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice, which has been involved in court challenges to a handful of the voter ID laws around the country. “This is not an issue that has gone away.”

Maine: Panel unlikely to recommend voter ID for Maine elections | Bangor Daily News

A five-member panel charged with reviewing Maine’s election system and suggesting improvements is unlikely to recommend that the state require voters present identification — photo or otherwise — at the polls. The Commission to Study the Conduct of Elections in Maine met Friday to begin drafting its report with recommendations for strengthening Maine’s election system. A majority of the commission’s members said they opposed instituting a voter identification system in Maine. “It really comes down to the fact that there isn’t any need in Maine at this time, and there isn’t the will for it,” said former U.S. Attorney Paula Silsby, one of the commission members.

Voting Blogs: Why We Should Still Pay Attention to Voter Registration Drives | Brennan Center for Justice

If you thought voting rights battles ended with the election, think again. Tomorrow morning the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit will hear argument in an action challenging Texas’s new laws restricting voter registration drives. U.S. District Court Judge Gregg Costa issued an injunction blocking the laws in August. The Brennan Center, along with the League of Women Voters and Rock the Vote, has filed an amicus brief urging the appellate panel to uphold the lower court’s ruling.

Editorials: Tidying up the 2012 election | The Washington Post

They are still counting votes in Ohio, a process that once seemed as if it might transfix the nation and require the attention of the Supreme Court, but now it’s something more like an asterisk. County elections boards around the state are putting the finishing touches on the democratic process. They must decide which of the more than 200,000 provisional ballots should be accepted and which rejected. The finale is rigorously bipartisan.

Voting Blogs: Three Ways to Fix Our Democracy | Brennan Center for Justice

The 2012 election is over, but there are still clear challenges to the integrity of our democracy. A wave of laws passed in the last two years to make it harder for millions of eligible Americans to vote. Fortunately, most of the worst were blocked or weakened. But they had a clear impact on Election Day — long lines and confusion at the polls, compounded by broken voting machines and poorly trained poll workers. As President Obama said in his speech, “We have to fix that.” Here are three ways to improve our democracy and bring it into the 21st century.

Editorials: Here’s a thought. Why don’t we make voting easy? | The Washington Post

Of course: Republican Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker is reacting to Democratic electoral victories by trying to make it harder for people to vote. He wants to end same-day voter registration. Same-day voter registration is, in fact, a bad policy — because registration should be automatic. But in the current situation it’s the least-bad of bad policies. That’s because everything about voter registration in this country is awful. We should have universal, automatic voter registration. Period. End of story. Just as most democracies do.

National: Voting Problems Renew Efforts to Overhaul System | Roll Call

Election experts and activists are calling for an overhaul of the voting system after hours-long lines, machine malfunctions and other obstacles plagued polling places around the country last week and in some cases delayed the results of races for days. Buoyed by President Barack Obama’s promise to “fix” the system in his acceptance speech, interested parties are coalescing around a campaign to retool the registration and voting process to avoid a meltdown in tight contests down the road.

Voting Blogs: We Have to Fix That | Brennan Center for Justice

On Tuesday, millions of Americans stood in long lines at crowded polling stations to exercise their right to vote. It was heartening to see that so many Americans care so deeply about their democracy that they were willing to endure considerable inconvenience to have their say. Although most were ultimately able to cast a ballot, the long lines were a disgrace. As President Obama said that night, “We have to fix that.” And we have to do so now. Long lines were the most visible manifestation of the problems with our voting system; unfortunately, those problems run deeper. I spent Election Day helping to field calls from voters across the country on behalf of the Election Protection Coalition, which runs the nation’s largest non-partisan voter protection hotline. I have also been monitoring the election process and its problems throughout the lead-up to November 6th. These are the key takeaways.

National: Voting rights groups call for election reforms | Shreveporttimes

Some voters waited seven hours Tuesday to cast ballots. Electronic voting machines broke down at other polling places, and election officials in many states scrambled to find enough poll workers. Citing those issues and others, voting and civil rights groups have renewed calls for Congress to fix problems with how the nation votes and to modernize the voter registration process.

Editorials: Five ways to make long elections lines shorter | Washington Post

“I want to thank every American who participated in this election,” President Obama said in his acceptance speech Tuesday, “whether you voted for the very first time or waited in line for a very long time.” At the mention of long waits, Obama paused. “By the way, we have to fix that.” Election Day saw news story after news story about interminable lines at polling stations. In some areas, people waited for two hours, three hours, or more. To many observers, it seemed ludicrous that a country as advanced and as wealthy as the United States can’t figure out how to hold a decent election. So what was the problem? Why do long lines persist? And is there anything Obama and Congress can do to make our voting system more efficient? I put this question to a couple of experts, and got back five broad suggestions for ways that both the states and even the federal government could improve our voting infrastructure and reduce long waits.

Voting Blogs: How Minnesota’s Voter ID Amendment Was Defeated | Brennan Center for Justice

On Tuesday, Minnesota voters defeated a ballot initiative that would have amended the state constitution to require voters to present a photo ID at the polls in order to be able to vote. This was the latest in a string of pushback victories for voting rights, and the final verdict was squarely in the hands of voters. As recently as five months ago, the amendment appeared positioned for easy passage. Public Policy Polling’s first survey in June asking voters if they supported or opposed a constitutional amendment requiring voter ID, 58 percent supported the amendment and only 34 percent opposed it.

National: Battle over ballots averted, but not forever | Reuters

They sued early and often. Voting-rights advocates, along with the U.S. Department of Justice and some political party officials, tackled potential electoral problems early this election year. Judges blocked stringent voter ID laws, lifted registration restrictions and rejected limits on early voting. As a result, Election Day 2012 escaped the legal dramas of the past. While some local skirmishes landed in court, no litigation clouded President Barack Obama’s victory on Tuesday over Republican challenger Mitt Romney. But courtroom wars over the franchise are far from over.

Voting Blogs: Election 2012 Recounts | Brennan Center for Justice

With the polls deadlocked just a few days before Election Day, state recount laws once again take on national significance. It is no exaggeration to say that these laws could determine who is elected president in 2012. This issue brief takes a look at some of the most critical provisions of the recount laws in the 10 states identified as most likely to be “tipping point” states that could provide the decisive electoral vote in a close presidential contest (Colorado, Florida, Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Virginia, and Wisconsin). We also look at factors related to each state that could increase the likelihood of bitter recount contests. Download the Report (PDF)

Editorials: Election Day registration: The anti-voter ID | Salon.com

“Voter ID” has become the GOP’s weapon of choice in the fight to keep Democrats from voting, but progressives may have found an answer: Election Day registration. Virtually unknown two years ago, voter ID laws, which require citizens to present a certain form of government-issued photo identification at the polls, came into vogue when Republicans used their electoral gains in 2010 to pass them in states from Texas to Wisconsin to South Carolina. Approximately one in 10 potential voters in these states lack photo ID, according to the nonpartisan Brennan Center for Justice, without which they will not be able to cast a ballot in November. Studies have found that minorities, college students and poor voters — groups that tend to vote Democratic — will be disproportionately impacted by these new laws.

National: Getting to Vote Is Getting Harder | NYTimes.com

A wave of at least 180 proposed laws tightening voting rules washed over 41 statehouses in 2011 and 2012, by the count of New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice. Only a fraction of those bills passed and survived the scrutiny of the courts, but the new rules cover voters in 13 states, several quite populous, in time for next month’s election. More laws are to start afterward. Partisans and experts are arguing, over the airwaves and in the courts, about the effects of all this on voter turnout, for which few studies exist. (The most rigid voter ID laws are believed to affect about 10 percent of eligible voters, said Lawrence Norden of the Brennan Center.)

National: Effect of States’ Voter Laws Is Hard to Identify | WSJ.com

Voters in more than two dozen states next month will be asked to provide some form of identification before casting a ballot. How many Americans who would otherwise vote will be turned away or won’t turn up at all remains a hotly contested number. Some researchers have tried to count the number of voters affected, by surveying people about whether they have the required ID. This has produced a wide range of results, though, and some researchers question whether people whose IDs aren’t valid are aware of it, and whether they would rectify the situation if their state passed a tough ID law. Other researchers instead study actual effects of voter-ID laws on past turnouts. But the strictest forms of such laws—which require photographic identification and are studied most closely because they are thought likeliest to exclude the greatest number of people—took effect just before an exceptional presidential election that made it difficult to isolate their effect. As a result, such studies haven’t been able to convincingly demonstrate that these laws suppress turnout. “It’s so tricky to filter out unrelated factors, some of them unique to the election cycle, that may dissuade people from voting,” said Tim Vercellotti, a political scientist at Western New England University in Springfield, Mass.

National: Many Strict Election Laws Blocked or Delayed | Associated Press

Tough new election laws aimed at forcing voters in many states to show photo identification at polling places have been blocked or delayed, delighting opponents who claim they were among a variety of partisan attempts to keep minorities from voting. Supporters of the measures nevertheless predict they will prevail in the long run. And court battles continue in some states even as the Nov. 6 election date draws near. The stakes are high especially in swing states where a close margin is expected in the race between Democratic President Barack Obama and Republican nominee Mitt Romney, as well as in numerous congressional and local campaigns. Other battles in key states such as Florida and Ohio have been fought over reductions in the number of early voting days and new restrictions on voter registration drives.

National: State voting-law cases test Supreme Court’s politics just ahead of Election Day | USAToday

Efforts by some states that could make it tougher to register to vote or vote are heading toward the Supreme Court, providing a fresh test of the justices’ political mettle. The court agreed Monday to hear Arizona’s appeal of a lower-court ruling that blocked the state from requiring proof of citizenship when registering by mail. The case, which could affect other states including Alabama, Georgia, Kansas and Tennessee, likely will be heard in the winter and decided in the spring. More urgent is the court’s imminent decision whether to hear Ohio’s appeal of lower-court rulings that blocked the state from closing early voting centers three days before the election, while allowing military and overseas voters continued access. President Obama’s campaign is opposing the state’s case.

National: The controversy over state photo ID laws for voting continues to heat up | Washington Times Communities

I have a dirty little secret: I am legal to vote in two different states. Neither state requires photo identification. I can vote in either or both this year. How cool is that? What a great country! This came about because I moved from one state to another a few years ago, but the voter registration records in my previous location were apparently never updated to reflect my move. The government makes mistakes? There’s something I never would have guessed. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, nearly 7 million people move from state to state each year. If other state agencies are as efficient as the one where I used to live, that means up to 7 million people could be registered to vote in more than one state every year. Mix in some illegal aliens who want to be citizens, the illiterate and the clueless, some political corruption – and there goes the liberal theory that current voter registration laws are fine just as they are.

National: 4 controversial rule changes to know in the 2012 elections | Alaska Dispatch

Voter ID laws have received plenty of attention recently, but they’re not the only controversial changes to election rules this year. Some states have made changes that critics say could impact individuals’ ability to vote. Here are four. Ohio won’t count provisional ballots mistakenly cast in the wrong precinct. Four years ago in Ohio, there were 200,000 provisional ballots cast among a total 5.7 million votes. This was the most among any state other than California. (Federal law requires states to use provisional ballotswhen a voter’s eligibility is in question or if their registration doesn’t reflect a new name or address.) But Ohio requires county election boards to reject provisional ballots if the ballot doesn’t correspond to the voter’s assigned precinct — even if it was the poll worker’s mistake. (A few other states have similar rules, but Ohio is fighting a lawsuit right now to preserve its approach.)

Voting Blogs: Rules May Change, But the Secret Money Game Remains the Same | Brennan Center for Justice

In the last six months, the disclosure rules covering the sources of money spent on elections have changed dramatically — twice. Despite those changes, one thing has stayed the same: moneyed interests have remained able to spend tens of millions of dollars on elections without having to publicly reveal who is doing the spending. In March, a federal court ruled that Federal Elections Commission disclosure regulations were too weak, in violation of Congress’s instructions to the agency. The court said that any group (or individual) that runs a type of advertisement called “electioneering communications” must publicly disclose the identities of its donors. These are the so-called “issue ads” run shortly before an election that mention a candidate but stop short of telling the audience to vote for or against the candidate. In response to the ruling, organizations switched to a different type of advertisement called “independent expenditures” — ads that expressly call for a viewer to vote for or against the targeted candidate. Prior to this ruling, many groups had avoided independent expenditures for tax reasons, but they were willing to face the tax consequences once it became the only way to hide their donors from the public.

National: After Pennsylvania ruling, future of voter ID in other states is unclear | Philadelphia Inquirer

A Commonwealth Court decision Tuesday resolves the question of whether Pennsylvanians must present ID at the polls in November, but it hardly ends the state or national debate on the subject. In recent years, 30 states have put in place laws requiring voters to show some form of identification before casting a ballot, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. In 2012, 33 states introduced legislation to either implement voter ID or strengthen or amend previously passed laws. In many, like Pennsylvania, there has been great division over the need for such laws. And by confining the decision to the upcoming presidential election, Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson Jr. ensured that the debate will continue in Pennsylvania.

South Carolina: Voter ID debate shifts to South Carolina as campaigners challenge restrictions | guardian.co.uk

The battle over voting rights in the November presidential election now swings to South Carolina, following the decision by the Pennsylvania courts on Tuesday to delay implementation of a voter ID requirement in that state. All eyes are now on the legal tussle between the department of justice and South Carolina, where probably the last voter ID law will be decided before election day on 6 November. Last year South Carolina became one of at least 34 states to introduce strict laws that require voters to present photo identification at polling stations – one of a swathe of measures attacking voting rights that swept across the US this election cycle. South Carolina’s law was blocked, however, by the Obama administration last June.

Pennsylvania: Voter ID ruling mirrors trend across U.S. | Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

With Pennsylvania’s latest upheaval over what voters must take to the polls next month, the state joins a series of battles across the country where opponents of photo ID laws have seen success for the current election cycle. Challengers have garnered temporary victories against photo ID laws here, as well as in Texas and Wisconsin. Federal officials also halted laws in Mississippi, and likely South Carolina, from going into effect this year. While a weak lawsuit against Tennessee’s tough ID law was tossed aside and a stringent ID card referendum still awaits Minnesota voters, opponents note that the ballot measure in Minnesota only drew support from 52 percent of respondents in a recent poll. “In most cases, the challengers aren’t losing; they’ve generally been successful,” said Keesha Gaskins, senior counsel for the Brennan Center for Justice, which has been critical of voter ID laws.

National: Voter ID Rules Fail Court Tests Across Country | NYTimes.com

A Pennsylvania judge on Tuesday blocked the key component of a highly contested state law requiring strict photographic identification to vote in next month’s election, saying the authorities had not done enough to ensure that voters had access to the new documents. The result, that Pennsylvanians will not have to present a state-approved ID to vote in November, was the latest and most significant in a series of legal victories for those opposed to laws that they charge would limit access to polls in this presidential election. With only a month left until Election Day, disputes around the country over new voter ID requirements, early voting, provisional ballots and registration drives are looking far less significant. “Every voter restriction that has been challenged this year has been either enjoined, blocked or weakened,” said Lawrence Norden of the Brennan Center for Justice, which is part of the New York University School of Law and opposes such restrictions. “It has been an extraordinary string of victories for those opposing these laws.”