Associated Press
Attorney General Eric Holder spoke to the NAACP last week and strayed from his prepared remarks, telling the crowd the truth about Republicans' voter-ID laws: they're modern-day "poll taxes." Yesterday, Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) condemned the comments, saying they "inflame passions and incite racial tension."
It's a fascinating perspective. When white Republican policymakers disenfranchise African Americans in an election year, based on trumped up allegations of "fraud," that doesn't "incite racial tension." But when the Attorney General notices white Republican policymakers disenfranchising African Americans in an election year, based on trumped up allegations of "fraud," that does "incite racial tension." Good to know.
In the meantime, while most of the recent talk about voter-ID laws has focused on who'll be blocked from casting a ballot, the Brennan Center for Justice has a new report looking at a different angle: those who'll struggle to get the mandatory ID in the first place.
New laws in 10 states requiring voters to show IDs could present serious challenges to voters without financial resources and transportation, according to a report released Wednesday.
The study by the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law, which opposes the new laws, found several obstacles that could keep voters from being able to cast ballots, including limited access to offices that issue the IDs required under the new measures.
"The advocates of these laws kept saying we're going to provide these IDs for free and that's going to eliminate all of the problems," said Keesha Gaskins, co-author of the report. "We found the ability to get documents isn't that simple."
This is clearly important. It's obviously a problem to create new barriers between Americans and their democracy, but this new study shines a light on the hurdle before the barrier: not only do many low-income voters not have the ID Republicans demand, they'll also struggle to get the ID. (Update: here's a copy of the Brennan Center report.)
"In some areas, the offices that issue IDs maintain limited business hours. Rural areas in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, and Texas are served by part-time ID offices. And in an extreme example, the researchers found the office in Sauk City, Wis., is open only on the fifth Wednesday of any month. That would limit the office to being open just four days this year."
It is, as Eugene Robinson recently put it, "an unconscionable crime."
Leave a Comment:
So WHY isn't Holder going after ALL of these laws?
Wisconsin's Republican AGs constantly tried to push the idea of fraud happening in that state. In Milwaukee, one of the AGs was literally laughed out of court by the presiding judge.
I have to ask. Why does the left keep portraying it's constituency as decrepit imbeciles incapable of proving they are citizens? It's degrading.
You're the only one saying that. WE'RE pointing out that not everyone has the money or free-time-to-golf-and-troll of a Shooter242 that they can spare to jump through unnecessary hoops placed by the GOP to reduce voter turnout and skew the results of voting... oh, and to combat the nonexistent scourge of voting fraud.
So I guess Perry's point is that the white elderly are also going to be disenfranchised?
Maybe those of us who see this as unconstitutional and a deterrent to citizens to do their patriotic duty and vote, will use our right to vote and vote out those who want to pass such immoral laws?
Putting Republicans in control of government is like letting John Sandusky run a day care. Both ideas are obscene.
Why? Because they have sided with the man that says he wants to drown the government in a bathtub? Maybe because they want to limit voting rights to privilaged people? Perhaps you think just because the Republican party is owned by the wealthy it will stop at nothing to give the country to them?
They have shown us what they are made of yet they still get elected. Sandusky however would never stand a chance as a daycare "dean" since he is a registered sex offender. People are far more opinionated about Sandusky and his perversion than by the attacks on freedom and democracy taking place in the halls of government and justice. Dirty laundry means more than a filthy flag. Mankind seems to be quite determined to become its own worst enemy.
Jerry. JERRY Sandusky. John Sandusky running a daycare would make for a HILARIOUS movie.
When do the arrests start against the conspiracy to deny the voting rights of American citizens? And can the authorities use waterboarding?
Did Perry make his remarks about "inflaming racial tensions" from his ranch N!ggerHead?
At <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2012/03/hispanics-hate-republican-party#comment-466539998">Kevin Drum's blog on Mother Jones</a>, I described the problems I had trying to get a learner's permit for my daughter. We did not have her birth certificate (lost or misplaced), and it took months to get a replacement. At least she is a minor, and so they would replace it on the basis of my own ID as her father.
I cannot imagine how much trouble it would be to obtain state ID for a person who cannot take time off of work, use the internet to research what paperwork is needed, and has to depend on public transportation to get to Motor Vehicles offices. In my rather smallish city (Las Cruces, NM), it can take over an hour to get across town by bus. I once literally walked from our downtown to the state university faster than I would have been able to travel by bus. This means that any excursion to the MVD would take an entire day's work.
And that's if all your papers are kind of in order. I also receive mail at my residence, instead of a PO box, and I have bills for utilities, bank statements, university staff ID and other official-ish documents. A person who deals in cash, uses a check-cashing service instead of a bank account, lives in an apartment with utilities included, etc. will have very little documentary footprint. If that person is female, and recently married, their name won't even match their birth certificate!
In Chicago, you can't get a state ID without a birth certificate and social security card. If you don't have a social security card, you can get one but you will need a picture ID which you can't get without a birth certificate and social security card. If you need to get a birth certificate only, they are $15 for the first copy. Take that over to DMV to get your ID and you'll need another $20. So, without transportation costs which is another $7 for a day bus pass, you're already out of $35 bucks. I know people that would pass on their "right" to vote because of the effort and cost now being attached in some states.
Not to mention lost wages for taking time off from work, or even losing one's job.
please tell me where you can go and not have to use your ID to purchase anything?? ANYTHING!!! go to the grocery....cash a check? get a library card? buy a beer? drive a car? please tell one thing you do not need some kind of picture ID????? what is wrong with asking for a an ID when you vote. When people go to get their welfare checks (or better yet to start it up) wouldn't they need a picture ID??? I am so confused about all of this, and why wouldn't every LEGAL AMERICAN DEMAND everyone that wants to vote show the state that they are a true LEGAL AMERICAN....why would that person who has worked hard and may have lost someone to war want what all have sacrificed for to be LEGAL......I just don't understand why you wouldn't want some kind of proof they were suppose to be there????? and don't tell me it will impede people because they can't afford to get an ID??? BS.....tell those people to not buy a pack of cigarettes or a bottle of booze or a bag of chips for a week and then they will be able to afford it....or maybe those people really don't want to VOTE have ya thought of that one!!!! no its just one more way this administration wants to fraud the election....otherwise why would they be screaming about all of this?????
If identification were free and equal access was made to every citizen, I would agree with you. Unfortunately, a number of issues make this impossible.
There are many who live on a cash basis, because they do not make enough money to maintain a bank account. If you can't make enough to keep a minimum balance, you're paying fees to the bank all the time, eating up your money for nothing. Instead, you take your paycheck to a check cashing place and get cash for a one-time fee. You don't need ID to buy things with cash.
All that Daniel and they would even CARE about getting to a polling place to vote?....lol, come on, its just all political pandering by the left to make another pathetic atempt to picture the GOP as the bad guy.
In order to register to vote you have to prove that you are a citizen by presenting a proof of citizenship of some sort--a birth certificate, a passport, a social security card. Typically you were issued a voter registration card that you took with you to the polling place on election day, and that card alone proved that your were eligible to vote because you proved your citizenship.
And, by the way, neither of the two most common documents used to prove your eligibility--your birth certificate or your Social Security card--have your photo on them. They are accepted by county clerks across the nation as proof of your citizenship and right to vote.
So if there really is a problem with voter fraud in this country, the focus should be on the actual voter registration process and not on proving who you are as you walk into the polling station.
But you see, therein lies the issue--there really isn't a voter fraud problem in this country.
The Republicans are trying to divert attention away from their chief aim--to disenfranchise voters likely to oppose their views--by creating a "solution" to a problem that doesn't exist.
Combine that with the amount of money being spent by a handful billionaires to buy the election (i.e., Koch brothers, Sheldon Adelson), and you quickly see at what lengths the Republicans will go to have their desired outcome in November. They have to do that because they've offered no real and effective solutions to the country's issues of their own. (As proven by the lack of any meaningful legislation coming out of this Congress for the last two years.)
Yes, only people who are eligible to vote should be allowed to vote, but ALL eligible voters should not have their right to vote impeded by completely unnecessary constraints.
In order to register to vote you have to prove that you are a citizen by presenting a proof of citizenship of some sort--a birth certificate, a passport, a social security card. Typically you were issued a voter registration card that you took with you to the polling place on election day, and that card alone proved that your were eligible to vote because you proved your citizenship.
And, by the way, neither of the two most common documents used to prove your eligibility--your birth certificate or your Social Security card--have your photo on them. They are accepted by county clerks across the nation as proof of your citizenship and right to vote.
So if there really is a problem with voter fraud in this country, the focus should be on the actual voter registration process and not on proving who you are as you walk into the polling station.
But you see, therein lies the issue--there really isn't a voter fraud problem in this country.
The Republicans are trying to divert attention away from their chief aim--to disenfranchise voters likely to oppose their views--by creating a "solution" to a problem that doesn't exist.
Combine that with the amount of money being spent by a handful billionaires to buy the election (i.e., Koch brothers, Sheldon Adelson), and you quickly see at what lengths the Republicans will go to have their desired outcome in November. They have to do that because they've offered no real and effective solutions to the country's issues of their own. (As proven by the lack of any meaningful legislation coming out of this Congress for the last two years.)
Yes, only people who are eligible to vote should be allowed to vote, but ALL eligible voters should not have their right to vote impeded by completely unnecessary constraints.
the other stuff i want to say is I have never seen or heard of so called educated people before that are just so stupid.....it doesn't take a rocket sceinist to figure out the economy??? its twice as bad as it was 4 years ago.....this gourp thinks well the obozo administration needs more time....more time to do what......BURY AMERICA!!! his done enough damage already. your children your grand children your great grand children and so on and so on....will be paying for this idiot for a long time......my GOD the comments you people make no wonder your the lowest watched listened to media.....cause msnbc has most stupid people in one room.....i listen to you guys about 3 minutes a day just to see what the enemy is doing.....yes the enemy.......you people are helping this administration destroy this country.....dumb dumb dumb.....when this is all said and done i want to watch your faces when obozo takes his little tele-prompter and says things like he did yesterday.....the TRUE OBOZO......what a guy.....dividing us in to lots of groups.....race, wealth, and so on.....what a wonderful president what a liar of a president.....and this country and its children owe it all to you msnbc you are helping fundalmentally changing america.....hope you remember this when your grand children ask??? we're studying the constitution in school can you tell me what a constitution is???? enjoy the destruction of AMERICA
I was alive 4 years ago and remember what it was like then. Most voters are the same. You have to be delusional to think the economy is twice as bad as it was 4 years ago. It isn't great now, but it is improving.
Mona,
I would be happy to show you all the things that you can do without ever having to show a photo idea, none of them however will be expressly protected, natural born rights guaranteed within the Constitution. However, if you have some specific reason or evidence to believe that a significant amount of people are trying to vote that aren't citizens I'd be willing to go along with the added expense of voter ID.
Now, I understand you are very upset about something but maybe you can be more specific about your grievances? That way we can discuss it and maybe find some solutions.
By what measure do you make the economy 2x worse than it was 4 years ago?
In what way is America "buried" and how did it get that way?
What will we be "paying for for a long time"?
In what ways is this administration "destroying America"?
I'm sure MSNBC appreciates your appraisal of their power to "fundamentally change America" even while being the "lowest watched listened to media"...
...but you and I both know neither of those statements are factually based.
So , what do you say? Let's not be enemies. Let's work this out together. Let's get some facts on the table and find some solutions. After all, we're all Americans here, aren't we? ...don't we all want a better America??
Four years ago, I was working for a retirement plannning company doing the reports for large organizations 401, 403 and 457 plans. During the crash of 2008, I saw hundreds of millions of dollars disappear from the accounts. These are real people with their entire life savings evaporating before their eyes. The Dow was as low as 6800. Today, the Dow is really close to 13,000. Anybody with a retirement plan doesn't have all of their money back, but they've got a really big chunk. It is easy for a person like you to sit back and chuck rocks (even if you intellectually know better) because you are much more invested in political rhetoric than truth and fact. We have a country here that is being crushed by special interests and financial shenanigans. Can't you get off your political pot and try to help save it?
Obama is a fraud.
http://www.wnd.com/2012/07/arpaio-obama-probe-finds-national-security-threat/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=6M7Rp_Ghv6k
You're using WingNutDaily as a source?
How about trying something with a better reputation for truth, such as the National Enquirer?
This is the issue the Democratic Party should be working every day. Their entire volunteer and professional staff should be working this ground constantly. They should be identifying and contacting the targetted citizens and arranging to take them to the offices they need to visit to obtain the needed IDs. The very effort of identifying targetted citizens will increase turnout. The ground pounders making sure voters can vote could prove the crucial difference this fall.
Unfortunately, Ron, there are now laws in place in some states which forbid precisely that kind of activity. Things like voter registration drives, and other aid given to help people vote, are now virtually illegal. It's almost like it was meant to work like that......
Mona - It's unfortunate that you seem incapable of remaining civil, or indeed forming a coherent argument. Any new restrictions put in place regarding voter IDs will automatically disenfranchise those voters who do not have the 'correct ID'. Please note that word - correct. So, for example, a student ID which is usually an acceptable form of ID, would not be regarded as valid ID were someone to try and vote. So the argument would be that the groups least likely to have the correct IDs would be the poor and students, who would also be the groups least likely to be able to spare money to purchase the correct voter IDs - effectively removing their ability to vote by imposing a financial test.
If a state imposes a requirement for specific voter IDs, then it behoves that state to make said IDs easily available and without up-front cost to voters.
The further problem exists that the idea behind voter ID is that it combats voter fraud - but without any voter fraud being shown to exist. So it's an unnecessary move, supposedly designed to combat a problem which cannot be shown to exist. Further, in those Republican areas that have recently implemented these reforms, there seems to be an effort to permit reliable Republican voters to use IDs they commonly posses (gun licences, for example) whilst removing the ability of reliable Democratic voters to use IDs they commonly posses (student IDs, for example).
So you have a non-existent justification for these laws, an effective financial test for voters and a clear partisan bias in the implementation of the new laws. Even without bringing the racial statistics into the argument, I find it hard to understand why objections to these measures (as they have been implemented) confuse you.
I would suggest that if a state brought in voter ID drives, and at the same time began a program of registering voters and providing free IDs in a convenient manner, regardless of voter demographics, you might find that there were far fewer objections.
What gets me about the US is that mass voter registration is a solved problem.
The US has what, ~65% registration? Here in Canada it is nearly 100% and implementing the key reason for that in the US would be nearly free.
How do we do it? There is a little checkbox on the first page of the main income tax form saying "I give permission for the Canada Revenue Agency to forward my information to Elections Canada." With that, most of us have annually updated voter information for the massive effort of a pair of pen strokes or a single click of a mouse.
Well said Azreal... I generally dont respond to CRAZY but you are one crazy, racist nut! Ron she's way beyond delsuional. The selective amnesia of these people is absolutely startling. Hopefully her 3 mins are up and shes moved on...
Obama is a fraud.
http://www.wnd.com/2012/07/arpaio-obama-probe-finds-national-security-threat/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=6M7Rp_Ghv6k
Please stop this birther nonsense! We non-crackpot conservatives can't stand you guys allow liberals to defeat us with this and the whole "Obama is a Muslim" idiocy! The Democrats love morons like you because they can stereotype all of us and successfully!
Sorry Az, I started to direct my comment to her and thought better... I didnt mean that YOU were
"one, crazy...
Do you need a state ID? I'm sorry, we'll need to see your birth certificate.
Do you need a certified copy of your birth certificate? I'm sorry, we'll need to see a state ID.
Strategy?: What if Romney's refusal to provide tax returns is just a diversion to take attention away from Voter ID laws? The tax return issue builds to a crescendo in the news media, meanwhile voter suppression stays under the radar until it's too late. Then Romney releases some tax returns that have no surprises.
Just a thought...
the researchers found the office in Sauk City, Wis., is open only on the fifth Wednesday of any month. That would limit the office to being open just four days this year.
I remember in the 60s, standing in registration offices in the South, watching the operation of poll taxes and "literacy" tests. This above is proof that the southernist scumballs who have hijacked the modern God's Own Party have definitely kept the operating instructions for denial of democracy on the hard drive.
Mona, perhaps you don't know your history well enough to understand what a poll tax is. If you charge people money to vote, then poor people won't vote. And that is unconstitutional.
If you believe that all registered voters have photo ID, couldn't possibly get through life without one, you are wrong. Some poor people don't have cars and therefore don't need a driver's license. And they can't afford to buy beer, either.
There are American citizens in this country who are already registered to vote, have voted for decades, who don't have a photo ID. Why should they have to pay money and schlep around town (or across the state) and pay to get a photo ID to be able to exercise their constitutional right to vote?
So ppl who cant get to a building to get an ID can get to the building to vote?....lol, liberalism....wtf.
Obama is a fraud.
http://www.wnd.com/2012/07/arpaio-obama-probe-finds-national-security-threat/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=6M7Rp_Ghv6k
Nobody is reading your links. Go back to wherever you came from.
Timmy go home to Fox, You are a fraud!!!!
I was registering down here in Georgia. What I saw were a lot of black folks (honestly used to this kind of crap) who stuck around patiently to get their IDs and a lot of confused (often openly scared and racist by thier own admission) white folks who were saying "I ain't showing up to vote for none of them bastards. Get ready for a confused and PO-ed white vote in states with ID laws and a possible unintended blue-tide in 2012.
I find it comical that GOP is rushing to prevent BLACK people from votnng. GOP mindset is not based in reality. They will disenfranchise many Blacks but as they do it they will be doing the same to many middle class whites. As we know majority of whites will vote for GOP. On 2nd thought no they wil not. LMBAO
GOP is full of dummies.
To get an ID or drivers license in Ga. You have to have four things. A certified birth certificate, social security card and two documents proving where you live. If you are a Senior citizen the court house where you might find a birth certificate might have burned down. They don't acccept the Bible as a record of your birth. How many people are not going to be allowed to vote in Nov? Enough to make a big difference.The Republicans will use any means to win. And this is the so called religous/evangelical people who want our vote.They will never get mine, I'm lucky I have ID.
It cost almost $100 to get one of our poorer church members the documents so he could register to vote. Between acquiring a birth certificate, time off from work and cost of a state issued ID that is acceptable in Oklahoma (they do not take my state issued employee ID at the polls), it is clear this law is designed to deny folks the right to vote.
Oklahoma is very red but has very little voter fraud--first in the nation to have standardized voting and voting machines across the state (starting in the 70s)--when the democrats were in control.
Another part of the story related to voter-ID laws is the double standard for people running for office. In Texas and Pennsylvania there is no requirement, that I could find, to show a photo ID when registering to run for office. It takes a voter-ID to vote, but not to run for office.
Still waiting on someone in the MSM to ask GOP what stopping early voting has to do with voter ID.
Just have a computerized voter roll with your picture on it, which will be taken and uploaded at ZERO cost to the voter, so that when you come in your picture will be pulled up and you go vote! But, I think MSNBC and Ms. Maddow would not want something like that in place because it does not help bolster their their convoluted and nonsensical "voter suppression"/"poll tax" fiction which they have ready to go in case Romney wins, so that they can claim his win was the result of fraud, and hysterically bellow how illegitimate his presidency is. Given how much of their base is uneducated and uninformed, it will likely work. If the GOP reverts to a more moderate stance, the Democrats are finished and they know this. Ok now, I'm just waiting for the spanking/fetish site owner (and I'm not name calling here, I can back this up) to start calling for me being banned again, because opposing viewpoints here tend to get shouted down by some, with hysterical ranting about 'trolls' or something else, instead of with reasoned discussion.