[csusbpeace] Democrats Are Mounting A Push To Expand Voting Rights After Big State-Level Midterm Wins
- From: "raccoon" <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> ("bigraccoon1")
- To: "CSUSBPEACE@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <CSUSBPEACE@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2023 12:37:12 -0800
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/democrats-voting-rights-states_n_63cb0781e4b0c2b49ad56964
Democrats Are Mounting A Push To Expand Voting Rights After Big State-Level
Midterm Wins
After winning legislative seats and taking over governor’s mansions,
Democrats will try to implement reforms and beat back Republican efforts to
restrict voting access.
Jan 21, 2023
After a surprisingly successful midterm election in which Democrats
<https://www.huffpost.com/news/topic/democratic-party> increased their power
in state governments, party leaders now find themselves in a position to
advance or protect one of the party’s top issues: voting rights.
Major voting rights bills are on the move in states like Minnesota, where
Democrats won complete control of state government for the first time in five
years, and New York, where Democrats held on to their majorities. In
Michigan, Democrats will now implement and possibly expand on voting rights
reforms enacted by voters after winning full control in the state for the
first time in 40 years. And in other states, like Arizona and Wisconsin,
Democratic gubernatorial wins will thwart any Republican laws rolling back
voter access.
After the 2020 election’s dual crises of pandemic and insurrection, Democrats
in several states enacted a series of bills, constitutional amendments and
ballot initiatives to expand voting rights and voter access. The COVID-19
pandemic revealed the public’s desire for easy access to alternatives to
in-person election day voting, while the Republican Party
<https://www.huffpost.com/news/topic/republican-party>’s lies about that
voting access showed the need to shore up systems of democratic elections.
With many reforms already enacted in Maryland, Massachusetts and Michigan,
the big action on voting rights will occur in Minnesota, where Democrats hold
a one-vote majority in the state senate.
“There is a big opportunity this session to take action on democracy reforms
that we haven’t had in the last 40 years,” said Lilly Sasse, campaign
director for We Choose Us, a coalition of grassroots, advocacy and union
organizations in Minnesota backing democracy reform.
On the second anniversary of the Jan. 6 insurrection, Democrats in both
chambers of the Minnesota legislature introduced the Democracy For The People
Act and announced the formation of a Democracy Caucus to work together to
pass legislation to expand voter access.
The Democracy For The People Act
<https://www.revisor.mn.gov/bills/bill.php?b=House&f=HF0003&ssn=0&y=2023>
would include provisions to establish automatic voter registration, create a
permanent mail ballot list, allow for pre-registration of 16- and
17-year-olds, require voting materials be distributed in multiple languages,
and restore voting rights to felons on probation or parole. Additionally, the
bill would increase voter intimidation and deception penalties and create a
publicly funded system of small campaign donation vouchers modeled after
similar programs in Seattle, Washington, and Oakland, California.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) called for the passage of voting rights reforms
after Democrats won full control of Minnesota government in the 2022 election.
The bill does not contain the elimination of the witness requirement for
mail-in ballots, an absence noted by Democratic Party lawyer Marc Elias
<https://twitter.com/marceelias/status/1612852308907270144>.
Democrats in Michigan also have a newfound opportunity to enact their top
priorities after winning control of the state legislature and maintaining
control of the governorship for the first time since 1983. But when it comes
to democracy issues like voting rights, Michigan voters already adopted many
of the proposals Democrats would put forward by backing two constitutional
amendments that were on the ballot in 2018 and 2022.
One proposal
<https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-government/voting-rights-ballot-measure-what-proposal-2-would-change-michigan>
provided for no-excuse absentee voting with prepaid stamps and a tracking
system, the establishment of a nine-day early voting period and a
constitutional right to vote without interference, intimidation or
harassment, among other things. These reforms will now need to be implemented
by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, both
Democrats who defeated election-denying Republicans in 2022, and the
legislature.
Beyond implementing the new amendment, voting rights advocates hope the
legislature continues to advance voting rights proposals. Their focus is on
legislation allowing for the pre-registration of 16- and 17-year-olds and
expanding protections for election workers.
Pre-registration would “streamline some of the process of young people
getting into the voter registration system,” according to Sharon Dolente, a
senior advisor with Promote The Vote MI, a democracy reform coalition in the
state. This could help alleviate the long lines that appeared at colleges and
universities
<https://www.mlive.com/politics/2022/11/hours-long-lines-on-university-of-michigan-campus-as-students-scramble-to-vote.html>
on election day in 2022.
In New York, where Democrats maintained their hold on the government despite
a subpar election, the state Senate is continuing a tradition of passing
democracy reforms as the first order of business that began in 2019 when
Democrats won back control of the chamber.
“New York historically has been a state that did not keep up with other
states’ election administration and voting reforms,” Susan Lerner, executive
director of Common Cause New York, a nonprofit that works on
democracy-related issues, said.
The state Senate passed legislation on Jan. 9 to legalize the provision of
refreshments to people waiting in line to vote, allow counties to run
portable polling locations, establish absentee ballot drop boxes, update
election technology and make voter suppression a crime.
These changes follow previous legislation that has eased voter access,
including the passage of automatic voter registration, early voting and a
state-level Voting Rights Act modeled on the landmark federal bill of the
same name.
Michigan Democrats, led by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D), won full control of the
state government for the first time in 40 years.
There have been hiccups as New York Democrats seek to update the state’s
election laws.
The legislature placed two constitutional amendments on the ballot in 2021 to
allow for same-day voter registration and no-excuse absentee voting, but
voters rejected them at the polls. The state Democratic Party organization
spent no money supporting the amendment campaigns. However, a Republican
billionaire funded a $3 million campaign
<https://www.timesunion.com/state/article/Billionaire-funded-barrage-of-ads-against-ballot-16616524.php>
against them.
While the biggest action is taking place in Michigan, Minnesota and New York,
other opportunities remain afoot across the country.
In Maryland, where Democrats won complete control of the government for the
first time in eight years, there is talk of passing a state-level Voting
Rights Act akin to the ones enacted in New York and Virginia. A similar bill
may also be considered in New Mexico, where Democrats maintained full control
of the state government. And voting rights advocates also hold out hopes that
Illinois and Oregon could advance bills that failed last session to allow
felons to vote while serving their sentences.
And then there are the states where a Democratic win in 2022 prevents the
passage of laws making it harder to vote. That is the case in Arizona,
Kansas, North Carolina and Wisconsin, where Democratic governors hold the
veto pen over their Republican-run legislatures.
Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs is the only first-time governor among these four
states. In her first term, her main sway over democracy issues will be
preventing further Republican legislation to reduce voting access or question
election results. The state GOP is still in thrall to wild conspiracies about
state elections – Hobbs defeated Republican Kari Lake last fall, and Lake is
still falsely insisting she won the election.
Hobbs will also have some ability to influence the operation of elections by
signing off on the state’s Election Procedures Manual, which sets rules on
how to run elections for county officials.
The last effort to adopt a manual in 2022 was scuttled when then-Attorney
General Mark Brnovich, a Republican, rejected then-secretary of state Hobbs’
revisions to the 2019 manual that both of them and then-Gov. Doug Ducey, a
Republican, approved. Democrats swept the races for governor, secretary of
state and attorney general in the midterms and can now set these rules for
local officials.
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