Resolving a three-year old lawsuit filed against the state of Ohio that charged widespread violations of the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA), parties in the case have submitted a settlement agreement to the court that should ensure voter registration opportunities for hundreds of thousands of Ohio public assistance clients. Evidence presented in the case had shown that many of Ohio's county public assistance offices were ignoring their responsibilities to provide voter registration to their low-income clients, as required by the NVRA.
After the 2008 election, voter registration has become a focal point for legislators and advocates from all ends of the spectrum. Whichever way it is sliced, the number of registered eligible voters has still declined since 2004. As multiple problems have been cited as the cause for lowered registration rates (including mobility issues, unequal access to registration opportunities, voter caging, and even so-called apathy), voting rights advocates as well as legislators have been vocal about their solutions.
A New York Times story this week reported that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is planning to return the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division to its historical mission: protecting the civil rights of Americans. According to the article, the new attorney general is committed to "a revival of high-impact civil rights enforcement against policies...where statistics show that minorities fare disproportionately poorly," including housing, employment, lending practices, and voting rights.
Signed into law by President Clinton in May of 1993, the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) was hailed by some as "the final achievement of the 1960's voting rights revolution," and proponents estimated that it would add 50 million Americans to the voting rolls. However, in a comprehensive new report released today by Project Vote, The NVRA at Fifteen: A Report to Congress, voting rights attorney Estelle Rogers finds that lack of enforcement, failures of state and federal leadership, and restrictive court decisions have left the full potential of the NVRA unrealized, and have left millions of disenfranchised Americans still awaiting the promise of a truly inclusive democracy.
Enfranchising America's least represented citizens is as simple as following the law: that's the message Project Vote and a coalition of voting rights groups sent today as they filed lawsuits against Indiana and New Mexico for failing to comply with the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).
In a major victory for voting rights, low-income voters in the state of Missouri will finally have better access to voter registration opportunities, thanks to a lawsuit settlement announced today by Project Vote, Demos, and the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.
Although the 2008 presidential election showcased a more diverse electorate with an increase in voter registration and turnout by historically underrepresented Americans - including youth and minorities - the movement toward a more balanced electorate that represents all citizens is still a work in progress. Advocates have long maintained-and recently Congress has heard testimony to the fact-that disparities in turnout rates are less an issue of voter apathy, and more related to a severe lack of democratic access for many groups. The growing awareness of this problem has inspired an increased interest among citizens, advocates, legislators, and officials to improve the administration of elections, particularly regarding voter registration.
In 2000, Florida's disastrous effort to purge former felons from voter rolls resulted in the disenfranchisement of hundreds if not thousands of legitimate voters and clearly influenced the outcome of the presidential contest in that state. History may repeat itself this November with states taking potentially reckless and unlawful measures to clean voter rolls before Election Day.
(Below, Chris rightly criticizes Clinton, Obama, and other Dems for fawning over John McCain, and his military record. Let's remember the true face of Republican contempt for those who serve. That's what this diary is about. - promoted by Paul Rosenberg)
Cross-posted at Project Vote's Voting Matters Blog Weekly Voting Rights News Update
By Erin Ferns
The ability of injured veterans to vote in November's presidential election rests in the hands of Bush Administration officials, who have so far refused demands from advocates and lawmakers that the Department of Veterans Affairs help hospitalized veterans register to vote.
"'It is an insult to those who have fought to spread democracy and freedom overseas to be denied the right to participate in their own democracy here at home,'" wrote Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and John Kerry (D-Mass.) to the Department of Veterans Affairs in March. "'If each facility took a few simple steps to provide voter registration materials, the VA could do its part to guarantee access to voter registration.'"
Cross-posted at Project Vote's blog, Voting Matters
Weekly Voting Rights News Update
By Erin Ferns
The debates surrounding the issue of expanding or restricting access to the right to vote are in high gear this legislative session at both state and Congressional levels. Bills filed range from proposals to lower the voting age to voter ID requirements. Project Vote's Election Legislation monitoring project has identified a surge of contentious election bills this year, but whether this is simply the result of the standard impact of a presidential election year or the byproduct of increasingly fractious partisan politics, the future of the foundational right of American democracy is being set right now.
This week Project Vote examines the progress of four hot-button voting rights issues through legislatures and the media. Youth voting in primary elections, voter identification (and its harbinger; accusations of voter fraud), felon disenfranchisement, and vote caging were all in play.
Advocates concerned with any of these issues as well as the entire spectrum of voting rights and election administration legislation can follow the progress of these types of bills through 21 state legislatures at Project Vote's ElectionLegislation.org tool (registration required).
From the technological glitches to voter intimidation reports to well-hyped charges of "voter fraud," American voters are well aware of problems in our system of casting and counting ballots. However, a range of these problems are often confused and conflated with "voter fraud" in media stories, trumped-up accusations, and, most insidiously, in voter suppression attempts. The truth of "voter fraud" is much simpler than many people would have us believe. This proves to be an inconvenient reality for those individuals engaged in systematic attempts to disenfranchise specific voting populations, much like the efforts that have been laid bare at the Department of Justice over the past eight months.
