I was just reading the remarkable book by “One Person One Vote” by Carol Anderson, which I highly recommend. Also a great article by The Center for Progress listed ways voters were under attack. So, I decided to review the ways that voter suppression has been applied recently.
During the 2018 midterm elections, voter participation was more than 10 percentage points higher than it was in the 2014 midterm elections, demonstrating Americans’ demand for change and increased enthusiasm for exercising their civic duty to vote. nearly 120 million eligible Americans did not participate.
Voter suppression against marginalized groups such as African Americans, Latinos, and more is a reoccurring problem in the United States. Some voter suppression measures actively seek to discriminate against certain groups, others result from bungling and glitches.
And voter suppression occurred in battleground states including Georgia, Texas, Florida, and North Dakota. Even a few thousand votes can mean the difference between victory and defeat in competitive elections.
In the 2018 midterm elections, according to Anderson’s book there was Voter purges, voter ID requirements, voter confusion, intimidation and harassment, long lines and much more.
The 2018 Mid terms exposed the ever expanding discrimination before and during that time. It is the duty of newly elected lawmakers at the local, state, and federal levels to enact affirmative policies that expand the franchise and make voting more convenient for all eligible Americans.
Voter registration problems
Despite efforts in some states to streamline the voter registration process registering to vote remains a significant barrier for many Americans. Finding out where and when to register, and getting paperwork, registering to vote can be confusing and hard.
Minor spelling mistakes in Georgia, disallowed 53,000 voters -70 percent of whom were black—were placed in “pending” status.Then, those with pending registration statuses were still forced to prove eligibility, including U.S. citizenship, before voting on Election Day. Michigan had voter database problems. The list goes on!
In some states, online voter registration, pioneered by Oregon, makes the voter registration process more convenient and drives voter participation because it eliminates the hassle of locating where to register, securing time off work, and finding transportation. In 2018, a lack of online voter registration proved a problem for Texans. In 2016, this was sued, however, the state’s appeal to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals prevented this from happening. Arizona had problems with poor online forms.
Voter purges continue, especially after a June 2018 U.S. Supreme Court decision that validated Ohio’s process for purging voters from voter rolls simply for not having voted in two previous elections and failing to return a mailer. Voter registrants in Cincinnati’s American neighborhoods were purged for failing to vote since 2012, compared with only 4 percent of registered voters living in the surrounding suburb of Indian Hill.15 The Supreme Court gave states a stamp of approval to manipulate voter rolls and keep eligible Americans, particularly people of color, from participating in elections. A 2018 report by the Brennan Center for Justice reported that voter purges were particularly prevalent in states with histories of discriminatory voting practices.
Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp (R) purged an estimated 1.5 million people from the state voter rolls, which disproportionately affected African Americans, whose voter registrations were removed at a rate that was 1.25 times higher than for white Americans in some counties.
Strict voter ID and ballot requirements
Eleven percent of all Americans lack the kind of government-issued photo ID that these laws require, while people of color, low-income Americans, and students are less likely to have qualified IDs than other Americans.
The U.S. Supreme Court allowed a North Dakota law requiring voters to have an ID with a current street address, thereby potentially preventing tens of thousands from voting—including an estimated 5,000 Native Americans.
Voters in Kansas without the right ID were required to vote on a provisional ballot. Kansas discarded provisional ballots at a rate that was 8.5 percent higher than the national average.
In Missouri. officials illegally ask for stricter forms of ID on Election Day because they disagreed with the law. In Georgia ballots were discarded because voters’ signatures on their ballots did not exactly match the signatures the state had on file.
Like Georgia officials, those in Florida initially discarded large numbers of voted absentee ballots and provisional ballots for purported signature mismatches. Across Florida, at least 4,000 absentee ballots were discarded for this reason.40 Laws requiring a voter’s signature to exactly match that which the state already has on file disproportionately impact Americans with disabilities and the elderly, along with young people. And although some election officials receive forensic signature training to assist them in determining matches, the process is not standardized and is largely subjective. In ruling that voters whose ballots were initially discarded for signature mismatches must be given the opportunity to “cure” problems, U.S. District Chief Judge Mark Walker proclaimed.
Voter confusion due to administrative errors and misinformation
Even well-intentioned groups have inadvertently misinformed people, while others have intentionally sought to confuse voters and prevent them from voting. Events such as these create confusion among voters and ultimately discourage citizens from participating in elections.
Voter intimidation and harassment
Florida residents have received a fake robocall alleging to be from Democratic gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum, but the call was ultimately traced to an Idaho-based white supremacist website. The website released a second racist robocall, in Georgia, in response to Oprah Winfrey’s canvassing for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams. In Missouri, a poll worker asked a voter whether they were “a member of the caravan,” in reference to a group of Latino asylum-seekers who are making their way from Central America toward the United States for asylum
In late October 2018, fake flyers from an unknown source were also distributed in Milwaukee, falsely informing residents that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) would actively patrol polling stations and detain anyone without ID.
Poll closures and long lines
The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies reported that long lines were estimated to have deterred at least 730,000 Americans from voting in the 2012 elections. Polling place closures disproportionately affect communities of color, low-income Americans, and young people. Kansas moved the last remaining polling location in Dodge City—a majority-Hispanic community—outside the city limits and far away from public transportation.
Delayed polling place openings leading to long lines and frustrated potential voters. For example, some polling places in Texas opened nearly an hour late because polling places were understaffed and poll workers were unable to operate voting machines and equipment.
Malfunctioning voting equipment
It is important that the equipment and machinery required to check voters in and tabulate ballots are fully functional. Unfortunately, many polling places experienced machine malfunctions and errors as well as computer glitches. So, voting machines in several Texas counties experienced vote flipping in the 2018 midterms. Election officials blamed the vote flipping on voters’ errors rather than the machines. These machines result in would-be voters leaving polling places without having voted.
In Georgia, more than 1,800 voting machines sat unused in a warehouse on Election Day in three of Georgia’s largest and most heavily Democratic counties
Disenfranchisement of justice-involved people
Approximately 6 million American citizens are barred from participating in the democratic process as a result of felon disenfranchisement laws. Although Florida passed Amendment 4—many Americans who have paid their debt to society remain excluded from voting in U.S. elections.
Alabama has attempted to expand the franchise to formerly incarcerated people. In May 2017, for instance, the state narrowed the types of crimes for which an incarcerated, but Secretary of State John Merrill (R) refused to allocate funding to publish information on what qualified as a disenfranchising crime.
People held in pretrial detention who had not yet been convicted of a crime were also disenfranchised in the midterms. Voting rights groups filed a class-action lawsuit in Ohio against state officials for allegedly depriving voting-eligible registered voters held in detention on Election Day from voting.
Gerrymandering
This is probably the most egregious act of suppression. Gerrymandering is when a political group tries to change a voting district to create a result that helps them or hurts the group who is against them. … Gerrymandering works by wasting votes.
Voter should choose the districts not politicians because redistricting can skew representation. In 2012, Pennsylvania Democratic candidates received roughly 50 percent of the votes in House races, but Republicans took 75 percent of congressional seats. Democrats in Ohio won more than 50 percent of the popular vote cast but held just 39 of 99 seats.
These shenanigans severely curtail political competition. In fact, the Cook Political Report projected that fewer than 1 in 5 congressional districts nationwide were competitive this year. District maps should not serve to shield lawmakers from the will of the electorate and the constituents they serve.
So, I urge you to be vigilant on these issues that affect all of us, but especially people at the margins. If this remains as it is now, the values fought for 40 years by the National Association of Black and White men will be imperiled. Vote as you choose, but vote next year.
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Sources: Center for American Progress, The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, and Carol Anderson’s book “One Person, No Vote”.