A 90 year old man who just happens to be the former Speaker of the US
House was denied a voter ID according to Texas's new voter ID
requirements.
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FORT WORTH — Saturday at a Texas Department of Public Safety office.
“Nobody was ugly to us, but they insisted that they wouldn’t give me
an ID,” Wright said.
The legendary Texas political figure says that he has worked things
out with DPS and that he will get a state-issued personal
identification card in time
for him to vote Tuesday in the state and local elections.
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Because a 90 year old man is trying to game the system, right?
But here is the real problem:
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But after the difficulty he had this weekend getting a proper ID card,
Wright, 90, expressed concern that such problems could deter others
from voting
and stifle turnout. After spending much of his life fighting to make
it easier to vote, the Democratic Party icon said he is troubled by
what he’s seeing
happen under the state’s new voter ID law.
“I earnestly hope these unduly stringent requirements on voters won’t
dramatically reduce the number of people who vote,” Wright told the
Star-Telegram.
“I think they will reduce the number to some extent.”
Wright and his assistant, Norma Ritchson, went to the DPS office on
Woodway Drive to get a State of Texas Election Identification
Certificate. Wright said
he realized earlier in the week that the photo identifications he had
— a Texas driver’s license that expired in 2010 and a TCU faculty ID —
do not satisfy
requirements of the voter ID law, enacted in 2011 by the Legislature.
DPS officials concurred.
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Not everyone will have the resources, or knowledge, that Wright has to
overcome these obstacles. And Wright puts it very well:
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We want to make sure that every eligible Texan who wants to cast a
ballot can,” Pierce said. “We want to help any Texan who needs
additional information."
Wright, who said he has voted in every election since 1944, lamented
that such help is called for.
“From my youth I have tried to expand the elections,” Wright said. “I
pushed to abolish the poll tax. I was the first to come out for
lowering the voting
age to 18.”
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The state put up these obstacles in the first place- now they are
'concerned' to make sure everyone can overcome them. They have
'solved' non-existent
voter fraud problems by creating actual problems.
