Senators gave tentative approval Thursday to add a constitutional amendment to the ballot in November requiring photo identification for voting. The votes in both the House and the Senate were strictly along party lines, with Republican super-majorities backing the amendment and Democrats opposing it. Republican supporters said the requirement, should voters approve it, would ensure electoral integrity and restore public confidence. “Voting is a very privilege for us, and many have died to give us that privilege, and it needs to be protected,” said Sen. Joyce Krawiec, R-Forsyth. “This is the first step in doing that.” But Democrats blasted the proposal – and its Republican supporters – as fear-mongering in the pursuit of voter suppression, pointing out that an audit of the 2016 presidential election by the State Board of Elections and Ethics Enforcement found only one case of voter impersonation that would have been prevented by voter ID.
“Republicans have scared our citizens with the prospect that someone is impersonating them at the polls,” accused Sen. Terry Van Duyn, D-Buncombe, chastising the state GOP for wrongly accusing hundreds of lawful voters of voting fraud in the wake of the 2016 election, in which then-Gov. Pat McCrory was narrowly defeated by Gov. Roy Cooper.
“We are quickly becoming a state where it is easier to falsely accuse people of voter fraud than it is to actually vote,” Van Duyn said.
Full Article: Voter ID amendment one step from ballot :: WRAL.com.