Tag Archives: Voter ID

Is Voter Fraud An Issue

Election Fraud

As a follow up to my last post, I have thought it would be important to point out that the Republicans might have a point when it comes to the illegal immigrant and their desire to vote.

Namely, do they?  Do immigrants, not yet citizens, vote?

Yes:

How many non-citizens participate in U.S. elections? More than 14 percent of non-citizens in both the 2008 and 2010 samples indicated that they were registered to vote. Furthermore, some of these non-citizens voted. Our best guess, based upon extrapolations from the portion of the sample with a verified vote, is that 6.4 percent of non-citizens voted in 2008 and 2.2 percent of non-citizens voted in 2010.

So, 14% of non-citizens REGISTERED to vote and 6.4% voted in 2008 and 2.2% voted in 2010.  That sounds like a lot, but is it?

Because non-citizens tended to favor Democrats (Obama won more than 80 percent of the votes of non-citizens in the 2008 CCES sample), we find that this participation was large enough to plausibly account for Democratic victories in a few close elections. Non-citizen votes could have given Senate Democrats the pivotal 60th vote needed to overcome filibusters in order to pass health-care reform and other Obama administration priorities in the 111th Congress. Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) won election in 2008 with a victory margin of 312 votes. Votes cast by just 0.65 percent of Minnesota non-citizens could account for this margin. It is also possible that non-citizen votes were responsible for Obama’s 2008 victory in North Carolina. Obama won the state by 14,177 votes, so a turnout by 5.1 percent of North Carolina’s adult non-citizens would have provided this victory margin.

Yup – again, it is a lot.  And further, may have given Franken his seat as well as Obama North Carolina.

Why Republicans Are Exercised About Voter ID

Immigration

Contrary to popular Democratic shoe banging, Republicans are not passing voter ID laws to restrict poor and minority voters from voting.  Republicans are passing voter ID laws because Democrats want illegal aliens to vote – and those people vote for Democrats:

Are voters ready to let illegal immigrants vote? A sizable number, including most Democrats, are.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that one-out-of-three Likely U.S. Voters (35%) now believes that illegal immigrants should be allowed to vote if they can prove they live in this country and pay taxes. Sixty percent (60%) disagree, while five percent (5%) are undecided. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

Fifty-three percent (53%) of Democrats think tax-paying illegal immigrants should have the right to vote. Twenty-one percent (21%) of Republicans and 30% of voters not affiliated with either major political party agree.

Note – this is not LEGAL immigrants, still not citizens mind you, but ILLEGAL immigrants.

Democrats want to extend this right only because illegal immigrants vote Democratic.

 

Voter ID – Alabama Style

Vote

Recently had a Facebook conversation with respect to the origination of the right to vote – federal or state.  Fascinating concept and a little disturbing.  I’ve always thought that the right to vote was precious and perhaps cardinal among the rights of citizens protected by governments.  Where ever that right emanates from, I would like to see it made clear that such a right is federally protected.

Anywho – during that conversation, the goings on in Alabama came up.  For those who don’t know, Alabama has passed voter ID laws and was recently allowed to implement them:

MONTGOMERY, Alabama —  Today’s U.S. Supreme Court decision clears the way for Alabama’s new photo voter ID law to be used in the 2014 elections without the need for federal preclearance, state officials said.

Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange and Secretary of State Beth Chapman said they believed the voting requirement, which is scheduled to take effect with the June 2014 primaries, can simply move forward.

“Photo voter ID will the first process that we have gone through under this new ruling,” Chapman said today.

Alabama lawmakers in 2011 approved a law to require Alabamians – beginning with the party primaries in June of 2014 — to show photo identification in order to vote.

Then, in a controversial move, Alabama has closed multiple DMV satellite offices – mostly in black and poor communities:

… Alabama just took a giant step backward.

Take a look at the 10 Alabama counties with the highest percentage of non-white registered voters. That’s Macon, Greene, Sumter, Lowndes, Bullock, Perry, Wilcox, Dallas, Hale, and Montgomery, according to the Alabama Secretary of State’s office. Alabama, thanks to its budgetary insanity and inanity, just opted to close driver license bureaus in eight of them. All but Dallas and Montgomery will be closed.

Closed. In a state in which driver licenses or special photo IDs are a requirement for voting.

Ouch.  First ‘Bama requires an ID to vote, then they close the offices where you can get one.  Direct evidence of a malicious attempt to restrict the vote.

At least in my eyes.

But then I learned this:

Alabama has 44 driver’s license offices throughout the state. It apparently also had 31 satellite offices that were open only part-time and that accounted for less than 5 percent of the driver’s licenses issued each year. Because of the budget passed by the state legislature, Alabama’s state government had to “allocate scarce limited resources in Fiscal Year 2016,” according to a letter sent by Governor Robert Bentley to Representative Terri Sewell, D-Ala. So the state government decided to close these satellite offices.

… in addition to being able to use a driver’s license to meet the voter ID requirement, you can get a free voter ID in every single county in the state. In addition to DMV offices, the secretary of state offers free voter IDs in all 67 counties through the local election registrar.

Furthermore, as Governor Bentley points out, those satellite offices being closed are typically “located in the county buildings where the registrars and probate judges’ offices are located.” So individuals who would have used one of the part-time satellite DMV offices to get an ID will be able to simply walk to another office—in the same building—to get the ID they need for voting.

Alabama even provides a free birth certificate or marriage license if you need it to get an ID. And if you can’t access a polling place because you are disabled or elderly, you don’t have to have an ID to vote by absentee ballot. Additionally, Alabama will continue to provide “mobile units to register and develop photo identification cards to those who need it throughout the state, and who may find themselves limited by lack of transportation,” according to Governor Bentley.

Finally, none of the critics mention that, in addition to driver’s licenses and the specially issued voter ID cards, you can vote in Alabama also using an ID issued by any state or the federal government—a passport; a local, state, or federal government ID; a student ID issued by any private or public Alabama college; and a military or tribal ID.

What does all of this mean?  Not sure, really.  I’m just not sure.

Literally it means that if you wanna vote at a polling place and don’t have a photo ID, you’ll need to get one.  AND it means that of the choices you have, there is one less in those counties that experienced a DMV closure.  However, it doesn’t restrict a citizen from obtaining a valid ID.  Further, it doesn’t make it any harder, the location is in the same place and furthermore, Voter IDs are free.

In the end, two things are emerging as truth in my mind – Voter ID laws are not “racist” laws and people who claim such are simply blowing their ‘protest’ dog whistle.  Second, the juice may not be worth the squeeze.  At some point, an analysis has to be made – how much time, energy, money and political capital is it worth to expend on this issue?  I’m closer and closer to arriving there.

I may just cry ‘Uncle’.

Voter ID In North Carolina

Voter ID

Will all you race baiting jack-wagons please shut the hell up?

Raleigh, N.C. — Voters in North Carolina will not have to show photo identification at the polls until 2016, but the state Division of Motor Vehicles began issuing free photo ID cards Thursday to those who don’t have other forms of identification.

Voter ID Laws And Paying The Social Debt

I was listening to NPR the other day and Diane Rehm was on.  I’m not sure what the official subject of the show was, but the conversation moved focused race in America.

One of the topics covered involved the voter ID laws being passed in many states in recent years.  The usual points were made in that these voter ID laws impact:

  1. The poor
  2. Minorities

I have my usual response to item 1 in that the cost of IDs is hardly onerous or burdensome.  But, be that as it may.

It was during the discussion that I was struck by thoughts surrounding item 2.  Rather than all this hand wringing over laws that make sense but disproportionately impact minorities creating this manufactured tension, why not address why minorities are disproportionately impacted.

I suspect that no one believes that a black attorney or a Hispanic doctor either doesn’t have ID or would find it difficult to get one.

Just another case of trying to manipulate outcomes to be equal rather than the opportunities.

Anyway, one of her guests was Richard F. America.  He discussed reparations in America and specifically mentioned this topic through the words of his book, “Paying The Social Debt.”

I though the conversation interesting enough, and the point of view different enough from mine, that I wanted to read the book.  So I went to Amazon:

Paying The Social Debt

I’m sure there are a ton of good reasons, but I was just struck by the stones required to charge a hundred bucks for a book on paying social debts.

Racism – What Is It

Race Relations

I firmly believe that the term “racism” has reached the point where it is essentially meaningless, at least in a formal “words have meaning” sense.

In essence, people know that being racist is bad and that it involves something between one race and another.  In attempt to establish the high road, they label their opponents as that bad thing, never understanding what the term means.

The most recent example is North Carolina’s voter ID laws.  These laws, so say the opponents, are examples of racism.  The data shows that minorities and the poor are most likely to be burdened by voter ID requirements.  And therefore, laws demanding ID are “racist”.

Hardly.

I suggest something different.  I suggest that the very thing that leads to poverty is the thing that leads to an individual not having an ID.

When  turned 16, the VERY day I turned 16, I took my driver’s test and passed.  I obtained a license.  When the plastic came in the mail, my father sat me down and explained what a driver’s license meant.  He taught me that I needed to never leave home without it, ever.  That it needed to be correct and up to date.  When I moved, it needed to reflect that move.

Further, when I turned 18, he did the same thing with my social security card and birth certificate.  He taught me where they were kept, where I should jeep them and how I could obtain replacements in the event they were lost.

In short, a picture ID, a social security card and a birth certificate are  mandatory elements to a fully functioning citizen in the United States.  To not have one of these things was seen as unacceptable and delinquent.

So I ask you, what is more racist?

  1. Expecting that a fellow man be responsible enough to live in modern society in the EXACT way and manner that my father taught me and I my son?Or
  2. That we diminish expectations of modern life based on race?

Given that minorities and the poor suffer more from lack of ID, is the ideal solution to:

  1. Pass laws that make such reasonable and responsible behavior meaningless
  2. Admit that we don’t have dads teaching sons that keeping ID, birth certificates and SS cards is a reasonable requirement of all responsible people.

Voter ID

So it just occurred to me.

Why is it that the poor don’t have ID?

Is it an institutional barrier or is it that the same things that result in poverty also cause people not to keep ID on them?

Fix THAT!

Voter Fraud: North Carolina

Voter Fraud

For the record, I am FOR voter ID.  To think otherwise is nothing more than pure political gamesmanship.  In today’s world, to obtain a photo ID is next to trivial.

With that said, I acknowledge that voter fraud is rare.

Ladies and gentleman, North Carolina:

There Are No Journalists Anymore: Version 12,567

AP

I’m sure there are example on both sides of the ideology spectrum; right and left.

But this one’s a doozy:

RICHMOND, Va. –  Gov. Bob McDonnell has signed legislation into law that will require voters to carry photo identification with them to the polls, starting next year in Virginia.

Virginia joins four other states that have strict photo ID requirements in place for elections, an action Democrats decried as a Jim Crow-era tactic to suppress the votes of the elderly, minorities and the underprivileged.

“This is merely a continuation of attempts by Republicans to suppress the vote of individuals who are not likely to support their right-wing agenda. I guess it’s true that if you can’t win elections the right way, cheat,” said Sen. Mamie Locke, D-Hampton and chairman of the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus.

Republican majorities in the Virginia House and Senate pushed the bill to passage one year after a more modest GOP-sponsored voter identification law failed to prevent President Barack Obama from winning Virginia for the second presidential election in a row and a Democratic U.S. Senate victory.

Serious.

I think it is entirely fair to point out that one side, one team, feels the republicans are pushing this law through for the exact reasons mentioned above.  I have no issue with that.  And, in fact, that point was made by inserting the quote from Locke.  And further in the article, next paragraph, the reporter points out that republicans have their reasons for passing the law.

But the editorial section is totally out of line.

Pennsylvania Voter ID Delayed

The elections of 2010 continue to have consequences.  One of the biggest of those is the passage of voter ID laws across the nation.  In general, I have no issue with the concept of having to prove you are who you say you are.  In fact, it’s my belief that if you make rules limiting the age, the residence or the number of times an individual can vote, it should be a requirement to validate proof of identification.

Pennsylvania Voter ID Law

Pennsylvania is just one of those states that have enacted such laws.  In fact, the law is set to go into effect in time for this election cycle in November, just 5 weeks away.  The law, and especially the timing, has drawn the ire of liberals all over the country.

The law requires:

That people show either a state driver’s license, government employee ID or a state non-driver ID card in order to vote on November 6.

Again, by itself, the law is perfectly reasonable in my mind and, in fact, should have been enacted long long ago.

Judge Rules To Halt Law

However, while the requirement to display valid ID is a good one, the judge has ruled that the law imposed significant hurdles in obtaining the proper ID before election time and was unreasonable in its timeline.

In short, the law stands but won’t take effect for the upcoming election.

I agree with the judge on this one.  The idea of the law is that we protect the sanctity of the voting process.   Given that we  have been faced with lax laws regarding this for decades, one more election isn’t going to result in a result incongruous with past elections.  However, if the law was passed in order to affect the outcome of THIS election, then I have an issue with an unstated voter restriction for the very specific purpose of electing a specific candidate.

And that’s wrong.

The law is good.  The timing is bad.