Editorials: The Next attack on voting rights and why Democrats should fight for a constitutional right-to-vote amendment | Jamelle Bouie/Slate

he last round of voter restrictions came after the 2010 Republican wave, when new GOP majorities passed voter identification laws and slashed ballot access in states like Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Florida. Now, three months after the 2014 Republican wave, another class of state lawmakers are prepping another assault on voting rights under the same guise of “uniformity” and “ballot integrity.” In Georgia, reports Zachary Roth for MSNBC, Republicans are pushing a bill to slash early voting from the present maximum of 21 days to 12 days. The goal, says Rep. Ed Rydners, a sponsor of the proposal, is “clarity and uniformity.” “There were complaints of some voters having more opportunities than others,” he said, “This legislation offers equal access statewide.” If cities like Atlanta want to have more voting access, said Rydners, they could open more precincts and “pay to have poll workers present.”

Voting Blogs: The Right to Vote Amendment is Worth At Least One Candle: A Reply to Heather Gerken | Josh Douglas/Election Law Blog

A new constitutional amendment affirmatively granting the right to vote could have a significant impact on protecting voting rights for all Americans. Most significantly – and perhaps paradoxically – we are likely to see the biggest effects of a federal amendment where we least expect it: in state courts. Professor Heather Gerken, in a characteristically eloquent and well-reasoned new article, claims that pursuing a new constitutional amendment enshrining the right to vote is “not worth the candle.” The heart of Professor Gerken’s argument is that the benefits of a new right-to-vote amendment do not justify the costs involved, particularly as Supreme Court Justices and other federal judges are unlikely to alter the scope of voting rights analysis given the likelihood that, to pass, the amendment’s language would have to be too vague. But a constitutional amendment granting the right to vote does not need federal judges, or even the U.S. Supreme Court, to have a big impact. That is because many state courts follow federal law even when construing their own state constitutions.  So a new provision in the federal Constitution, even if couched in broad platitudes, will have corollary effects on state constitutional law.

Maryland: Freshman delegate pushes bill to restore voting rights for felons | The Washington Post

A freshman delegate in the Maryland General Assembly is championing a cause that has deep personal meaning for him: the restoration of full voting rights for ex-offenders. Del. Cory V. McCray (D-Baltimore), who was arrested on the streets of East Baltimore more times than he can remember, recognizes that he could easily have been among the estimated 40,000 ex-offenders in Maryland who face obstacles to voting. The former teenage drug dealer is the lead House sponsor of a bill that promotes voting rights for former felons who have been prohibited from casting a ballot in Maryland. Nationally, an estimated 5.85 million Americans are unable to vote because of felony convictions, according to the Sentencing Project, a nonprofit criminal justice think tank.

Washington: Federal judge orders district voting for Yakima in ACLU case | Yakima Herald Republic

Citing the disenfranchisement of Latinos under Yakima’s current council elections system, a federal judge on Tuesday ordered the city to conduct future elections using seven geographic districts — including two majority Latino districts. Under U.S. District Judge Thomas Rice’s ruling, all seven City Council positions would be placed on the ballot this year and candidates would be elected by voters solely from within their district. Under the ruling, candidates would no longer be voted on citywide. The ruling comes in a voting rights lawsuit filed more than two years ago by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of two Latino residents. Rice, of the Eastern District Court of Washington, ruled in August that the city’s hybrid election system of at-large and district voting routinely “suffocates” the will of Latino voters.

Editorials: The UK should encourage prisoners to be good citizens and let them vote | Juliet Lyon/openDemocracy

Last week’s ruling by the European Court of Human Rights on prisoners’ voting reinforces previous judgments of the Court that the UK’s blanket ban on sentenced prisoners voting is unlawful. But with three months to go before the UK general election, it’s clear that the government would rather flout human rights law, ignore the advice of prison governors, bishops to, and inspectors of, prisons and take up Parliamentary time and taxpayers’ money in order to stop sentenced prisoners from acting responsibly by voting in democratic elections. For ten years now successive UK governments have wasted public money resisting the European Court’s judgment. The current Prime Minister has even admitted to feeling “physically ill to even contemplate having to give the vote to anyone who is in prison”.

California: Latino activists consider voting rights lawsuit against Orange County | KPCC

Activists in Orange County are considering a voting rights lawsuit after a Latino supervisorial candidate lost a special election last month. Some activist say county district lines split Latino residents and dilute their voting power. This month, Vietnamese American attorney Andrew Do was sworn into office as First District Supervisor after beating career Latino politician Lou Correa in a special election by 43 votes. There are now three Asian American supervisors and two white supervisors. “(Latinos) have no voice in the county government,” said Latino activist Art Montez. “No voice in health care, they have no voice as to what public parks are going to get.

Myanmar: Myanmar nullifies temporary ID cards after nationalist protest | Bangkok Post

Myanmar Wednesday said identity cards for people without full citizenship, including Muslim Rohingya, will expire within weeks, snatching away voting rights handed to them just a day earlier after nationalist protests at the move. The Rohingya along with hundreds of thousands of people in mainly ethnic minority border areas, who hold the documents ostensibly as part of a process of applying for citizenship, will see their ID cards expire at the end of March, according to a statement from the office of President Thein Sein late Wednesday. “Those who are holding temporary identity cards must give back the expired registration documents,” the statement said, in a move that effectively overrides a clause giving them the right to vote in a constitutional referendum in a bill enacted with presidential approval on Tuesday. The dramatic about-face comes after dozens of protesters gathered in the commercial hub Rangoon Wednesday to call on the government not to allow people without full citizenship to vote in the proposed referendum.

Iowa: How shy stay-at-home mom is shaking up a major voting ban | MSNBC

In 2013, Kelli Griffin went to vote in a local election in Montrose, Iowa. She had been through some hard times — a survivor of domestic abuse who had suffered from drug addiction, she was convicted in 2008 of a drug-related crime, and served five years probation. But now Griffin was turning her life around, and voting was a rite of passage. She even took her four kids to the polls to teach them about the democratic process. “I felt good,” said Griffin, 41. “I mean, it’s one of the steps to being back into society, to fulfilling that I am just like everybody else. I mean, I’ve overcome a lot.” But what happened next would make clear that in the eyes of the law, Griffin wasn’t at all like everybody else. It would set this shy stay-at-home mom who never graduated college on a path to challenging her state’s highest officials. And it would help spark the latest step in a growing push-back against a set of laws that, five decades after the passage of the Voting Rights Act, still disenfranchise millions of Americans.

Voting Blogs: The Voter ID Law that No One is Talking About: Why Voting Rights Activists Should Take Notice of Tennessee | State of Elections

With the Supreme Court recently issuing a flurry of orders and stays on the implementation of certain states’ voter ID laws—allowing some to be in effect for the 2014 midterms, but blocking another—there has been no shortage of attention on voting rights developments. While states, such as Texas and North Carolina, are often criticized for having some of the strictest voter ID laws in the country, little scrutiny has been placed on another state’s voter ID requirement that is arguably just as burdensome and theoretically more primed for a constitutional challenge: Tennessee. Despite receiving scant attention from the national media, a recently released study by the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that Tennessee’s three-year old voter ID law has deterred voter turnout, notably among younger voters. According to U.S. Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.), the report proves that the state’s voter ID law unfairly suppresses Tennessee residents’ voting rights.

Puerto Rico: Voting Rights For Noncitizens Debated | International Business Times

Puerto Rico is undergoing a widespread debate regarding the governor’s plans to support a bill extending voting rights to all island residents, regardless of immigration status. Puerto Rico’s largely Dominican immigrant community has celebrated the proposal, but opponents say the move will undermine the privileges granted by citizenship. Gov. Alejandro García Padilla declared last month he would submit legislation allowing all noncitizen residents to vote in islandwide elections, a move with significant implications for the hundreds of thousands of Dominican immigrants estimated to be living on the island.

Washington: Moscoso introduces new version of Washington Voting Rights Act | HeraldNet

Democratic State Rep. Luis Moscoso has introduced a new version of the Washington Voting Rights Act. Moscoso introduced the bill Thursday, Jan. 28. It is scheduled for a hearing Thursday, Feb. 5, before the House committee on state government. It would empower local governments to tailor solutions to systemic electoral issues, which, he said, ensure fairness in local elections and a voice for all communities.

Luxembourg: Campaigners push for yes vote on foreigner voting rights | Luxemburger Wort

Expat organisations in Luxembourg have relaunched their migration and integration platform in a bid to educate the public and promote foreigner voting rights. On June 7, this year, Luxembourg’s electorate will decide whether or not it approves of voting rights for foreign nationals resident in the country in legislative elections. Ahead of this consultative poll, the Migration and Integration platform or MINTÉ is campaigning in favour of a yes vote.

National: Lynch Pressed on Voting Laws at Confirmation Hearing | National Law Journal

During the Wednesday afternoon session of Loretta Lynch’s confirmation hearing, Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., pressed the attorney general nominee over her position on voting laws—and at one point tried to show she’d contradicted herself. Tillis, elected to the Senate in November, asked Lynch about the sweeping voting bill North Carolina’s governor signed into law in August 2013 while Tillis was speaker of the House in the state’s Republican-controlled Legislature. “It’s not something that I’m intimately familiar with,” Lynch, born in Greensboro, N.C., responded. “I look forward to learning more about it should I be confirmed, and I believe the matter will proceed to court and we will await the results there.” Tillis then focused attention to remarks Lynch delivered on a Martin Luther King Day celebration in January 2014. At the time, Lynch, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, had more pointed comments about her native state’s new voter laws. “Fifty years after the march on Washington, 50 years after the civil rights movement, we stand in this country at a time when we see people trying to take back so much of what Dr. King fought for,” Lynch said in comments available on video. “People try and take over the Statehouse and reverse the goals that have been made in voting in this country.”

Washington: State Voting Rights Act returns in Legislature | Yakima Herald Republic

A bill drafted with Yakima’s council elections system in mind has returned for a third straight try at passing in the Legislature. The state Voting Rights Act, which would make it easier to force localities to switch to geographic district-based elections, was reintroduced Wednesday in the House and with a companion bill in the Senate. The bills are sponsored by Rep. Luis Moscoso, D-Mountlake Terrace, and Sen. Cyrus Habib, D-Kirkland. The proposal would make it easier to challenge a local government’s elections format in court if evidence of racially polarized voting exists.

Puerto Rico: Governer Proposes Voting Rights for All, Regardless of Immigration Status | Good Magazine

Puerto Rico governer Alejandro Garcia Padilla has announced plans for legislation that would grant the right to vote to all of its estimated 200,000-400,000 undocumented immigrants. The statements came at a recent public meeting with the president of the Dominican Republic, Danilo Medina, during which the two politicians signed various agreements to tackle economics, education, security, and environmental issues together. “Today, we would like to break down the barriers that prevent immigrants from contributing all that they truly can to economic recovery and social progress in Puerto Rico,” said Padilla earlier this month.

Greece: Expats frustrated after exclusion from election | The Guardian

Watching the Greek elections unfold from her London office left Zoe Spiliopoulou frustrated. Like thousands of expatriate Greeks she was prevented from voting in Sunday’s polls after the Athens parliament failed to pass a law in time to overturn a longstanding ban. “It is really unfair being in London. I am still interested in Greek politics. But to vote means taking time off work and buying a plane ticket back to my town, which is two hours from Athens,” said Spiliopoulou, an urban designer who has spent the last three years in the UK. “Some people I know looked and return tickets cost £300. The airlines put the prices up when they know there is an election because they know flying is the only way many people can get back to the place where they are registered. And for some people it would be a seven-hour trip from the airport to get back to vote.” … In 2010 the European court of human rights ruled in favour of two Greek nationals working at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg who were unable to vote in the 2007 Greek parliamentary elections. The Greek ambassador to France had previously rejected their application, saying there was no legislation providing for “special measures […] for the setting up of polling stations in embassies and consulates.”

Guam: Territories’ voting rights lawsuit to be filed | Pacific Daily News

A national civil rights group is preparing a lawsuit against the federal government in an effort to grant the millions of citizens living in U.S. territories the right to vote in presidential elections. We the People Project, a nonprofit organization advocating for equal voting and citizenship rights for U.S. territories, is developing its case and could file the lawsuit within the next few months. “At this point we have a legal team together; we’re looking to identify people interested in identifying with the case,” said WPP President Neil Weare, a civil rights attorney. “Once we’re able to identify the plaintiffs we’ll proceed to file the case over the next few months.”

India: Community divided over citizenship rights | The Hindu

The Election Commission’s recent directive allowing Tibetan refugees to register for voter identity card for Delhi Assembly elections, which will help them acquire Indian citizenship, has not been welcomed by all and created a deep chasm within the exiled community. Those against acquiring citizenship rights argue that the Tibetans living in India must remain refugees as becoming an Indian citizen would “dilute the struggle” for a free Tibet. N. K. Trikha, national convenor of Core Group for Tibetan Cause, a pan-India group which advocates Tibet’s independence from Chinese rule, said, “Acquiring Indian citizenship will knock the bottom out of their reason for living in exile with a determination to return to their motherland or see her become free at some point in time.”

Ireland: Referendum on emigrant vote ‘unlikely’ this year, Deenihan says | The Irish Times

A referendum on whether to permit Irish citizens living overseas to vote in presidential elections is “unlikely” to be held this year, Minister of State for the Diaspora Jimmy Deenihan has said. The decision on whether to hold a referendum was due to be made before Christmas, but the matter has not yet been discussed by Cabinet. Speaking to The Irish Times after a round-table discussion on diaspora affairs in Dublin Castle yesterday, Mr Deenihan said two referendums, on marriage equality and the age qualification of presidential election candidates, would be put to the people next year, and “logistically it would be very difficult” to hold a third. The Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government is working on a proposal for overseas voting which will be discussed by Cabinet before the summer, Mr Deenihan said. However, this will not be included in the Government’s new plan for diaspora policy, due to be published in the coming weeks.

South Dakota: Native Voting Plaintiffs Got It Right, Says DOJ | Indian Country

The U.S. Department of Justice has submitted a Statement of Interest in the federal voting-rights lawsuit, Poor Bear v. Jackson County (South Dakota). The agency supports the Oglala plaintiffs’ allegation that restricting voter registration and in-person absentee voting (often called “early voting”) to an off-reservation county seat makes it difficult for them to vote and is discriminatory. The statement also cites the need to ensure that the Voting Rights Act “is properly interpreted and…vigorously and uniformly enforced.” “Many of us lack the vehicles and gas money to get to the county seat in Kadoka,” explained lead plaintiff, Oglala Sioux Vice President Tom Poor Bear. He and other plaintiffs live in the town of Wanblee, in the portion of Pine Ridge Indian Reservation that overlaps Jackson County. They want a Wanblee satellite voting office offering the same election services that the primarily white population of the county receives in Kadoka. They also want the county to come under special Justice Department scrutiny via the VRA’s Section 3.

Nebraska: Group threatens litigation if lawmakers pass voter ID bill | Lincoln Journal Star

Opponents of requiring photo identification to vote in Nebraska warn that court action is possible if lawmakers pass a bill this year that erodes or threatens voting rights. Two state senators introduced voter ID-related bills last week: Sen. Tyson Larson of O’Neill and Sen. Paul Schumacher of Columbus. Larson’s bill — cosigned by Sens. Lydia Brasch of Bancroft, Laura Ebke of Crete, Bill Kintner of Papillion, and Ken Schilz of Ogallala — would require voters to show a driver’s license or state ID card before voting at a polling place. Voters wouldn’t need an ID to request a mail-in ballot except when registering for the first time. “When we have to show an ID to write a check or buy alcohol (but not to vote), I find that to be wrong,” Larson said.

Georgia: Appeals Judges: Fayette voting rights case to go to trial | Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A contentious voting rights case involving Fayette County and the NAACP appears headed to trial. The three-judge panel in the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals sent the case back to the lower court for trial. “We conclude that this case warrants a limited remand so that the district court may conduct a trial,” the judges said in their 26-page decision. The decision came down late Wednesday afternoon. The appeals court ruling is the latest chapter in a three-and-half-year old legal fight over Fayette’s voting system.

Georgia: Fayette residents urge officials to end voting rights fight | Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Fayette County residents implored county officials Thursday night to abandon their ongoing fight over the county’s new voting system, calling it a costly waste of time. “I strongly urge the new commission… take another look at what’s going on with district voting,” said Terrence Williams, who lives in District 5, the mostly minority district created under the court-ordered district plan. “Take a deeper look and spend our money wisely. There’s other things we need to spend our money on.” “Don’t – I beg you – don’t step back,” resident Larry Younginer said. “I subscribe to the theory that change is difficult but change is necessary. Change is going to happen whether you like it or not.”

United Kingdom: Call for curb on foreigners’ voting rights | The Irish Times

Demands by Conservative MPs for curbs on voting rights enjoyed by 1.5 million foreign-born residents in this year’s British general election do not cover the 350,000 Irish-born people living in Britain, a senior Conservative backbencher has said. Earlier this week Graham Brady, chairman of the influential 1922 Committee of Conservative backbenchers, said voters from countries that do not offer reciprocal voting rights to British people should not be able to vote in British elections. Ireland does offer reciprocal voting rights to British citizens living in the Republic to vote in Dáil elections. This privilege is not offered to citizens from other EU states, who are restricted to voting in local and European Parliament elections.

District of Columbia: D.C. appeals to Republicans for expanded voting rights | WTOP

The corridors of Capitol Hill are lined with paintbrushes, ladders and hammers as the 114th Congress moves in to its new digs. Before the dust settles and while good will runs high, D.C. leaders will appeal to the new faces in the Republican majority for greater voting rights. On Tuesday, Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton plans to take to the House floor in an effort to win back the District’s vote in the Committee of the Whole, which she had during three Congresses. “I will make the point that in a democracy, the vote can never be tied to the party in power,” she says. “The vote is tied to the people.”

Kentucky: Supporters hope for voting rights reform | Bowling Green Daily News

Five prefiled bills in the Kentucky General Assembly propose restoring voting rights for many of the state’s convicted felons, and advocates say they hope reform can be enacted in a state with a high rate of disenfranchisement. The different acts of legislation are sponsored by both Democratic and Republican lawmakers. State Sen. Gerald Neal, D-Louisville, prefiled the first bill in the 2015 legislative session to call for an amendment to the state constitution to allow convicted felons to vote. Subsequent bills were filed by Rep. Darryl Owens, D- Louisville, Sen. Tom Buford, R-Nicholasville, and Rep. Jeff Hoover, R-Jamestown.

Missouri: Race and Voting Rights in Ferguson | New York Times

For most people, Ferguson, Mo., will be remembered for one awful August afternoon, when a white police officer there shot and killed an unarmed black teenager, Michael Brown. But that incident was only a snapshot in the town’s long and complicated racial history — a history characterized by entrenched segregation and economic inequality, as well as by familiar and systemic obstacles that have kept black residents from holding positions of political power. Ferguson’s population is two-thirds African-American, and yet its mayor, city manager and five of its six City Council members are white. So are its police chief and all but three officers on its 53-member police force. The school board for the Ferguson-Florissant School District is much the same: More than three-quarters of the district’s 12,000 students are black, but the seven-member board includes only one African-American.

New York: Voting rights accord rejected | Times Union

County lawmakers on Monday forcefully rejected a proposed settlement to a three-year-old voting rights lawsuit, sending the case back to federal court with an emphatic rebuke of County Executive Dan McCoy. The settlement would have ended the complex and increasingly costly case alleging racial imbalances in the county’s political map by, among other things, establishing a fifth legislative district in which minority voters are a majority. And while several of the majority Democratic lawmakers said that they support that goal, they blasted McCoy for freezing the legislature out of the settlement process and accused him of overstepping his authority in trying to dictate how the new lines would be drawn. High on the list of grievances is that the settlement would have prescribed the makeup of the county’s redistricting commission, a task legislative leaders said is clearly lawmakers’ prerogative. The vote was 34-3, with even some of the Democratic executive’s Republican allies opposing it.

United Kingdom: Bill to restore expat voting rights clears first hurdle in Commons | Telegraph

A Bill to restore voting rights to all British expatriates before next year’s general election was given permission by MPs to move to the next stage of the process today. Although a date was set for the second reading of the Bill, on March 6, it is thought unlikely that it will be successfully passed into law due to the slim window of time before Parliament is dissolved ahead of the general election in May. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, a Conservative MP, raised the matter in the Commons today, urging MPs from all parties to support his efforts to get the current ’15-year rule’ abolished as soon as possible. The rule blocks Britons overseas from voting in UK elections if they have been out of the country for longer than 15 years. In his speech, made under the Ten Minute Rule – a procedure that allows MPs to seek the leave of the house to introduce a Bill – Mr Clifton-Brown said the ban on voting affects an estimated one million of the 5.5 million Britons living overseas.

Luxembourg: Country divided on foreigner voting rights | Luxemburger Wort

Half of Luxembourgers would support a move for foreign nationals to vote in national elections, the final segment of the Politmonitor survey suggests. The poll tests the waters ahead of the 2015 referendum, scheduled for June 7, in particular in relation to foreign resident voting rights, capping ministerial posts to 10 years and religious subsidies. On foreigner voting rights, 47 percent of Luxembourgers who responded to the survey said they would support a move allowing non-Luxembourg nationals the right to vote in legislative elections. They pledged their support provided that to be eligible, voters had resided within the country for at least 10 years and had previously participated in European elections in Luxembourg. Of the total group polled, nearly two thirds (62 percent) support this move, as did 80 percent of foreign residents.