I think getting taken off the list because you haven’t voted and haven’t responded is not a big deal in itself.
The problem (or not) is what happens when you try to get back on. It needs to be simple and easy and quick to get yourself reinstated, and (most important) there need to be no unexpected “roadblocks” for people who want to vote.
Why (not “is it”, only why) should it be a problem to show up at the polling station with ID and proof of residence?
I’m a hard left Dem, and I don’t see the problem. Except for the people who have a franchise and ignore it. California purges people who don’t vote in presidential elections, if that hasn’t changed. If they, the people herding this issue, purged people who didn’t vote in a off-season or primary election, which generally don’t pull more than 20-30 percent of the electorate, that would be a problem. But then they would be deregistering their own people. If the Democrats don’t work work their party and make it care about their lives, we’re, simply, fucked. All the Democrats has to do is pay attention and convince people to re-register to make it stick. If we don’t care, we’re fucked. Again.
Given that this system exists the rules for purging seem reasonable. But there should be a national database of voters for federal elections where the entries are only purged by a death certificate. Such a database would contain no more than a name and unique id for each entry that would be referenced by some agency at the state or federal level which would maintain the minimal amount of information necessary to identify the actual voter for voting purposes. And about one hundred other changes to the rules and process of voting in federal elections.
I don’t have the time to study this issue in detail.
Should I trust a Justice of the Supreme Court? Or a bunch of anonymous random message boarders?
Hmmmm. Real tough choice. :rolleyes:
If the integrity of the election matters a current address and proof of citizenship should be mandatory. A mandatory driver’s license or state-issued ID would defiantly limited voter fraud, which the left seems to be okay with as long as it helps their turnout base. If someone can’t travel or dive to the polls, they could always vote by mail. For those saying there may be voter intimidation, there is none by mail.
How bad voter fraud isa separate topic. Let’s suppose its 1%. A small percentage of illegal votes, but as we know there are many close races where a 1% swing or less than could change the results.
I’d like to see new laws for voter fraud that include heavy fines, and a suspension of voting rights for 8 years.
The Donald claimed that three to five million illegal votes were cast for Hillary. Is that claim accurate, exaggerated, or a bold faced lie? Let it be noted that he no longer repeats that allegation, but neither has he repudiated it. So, what do you think that means? Its still true, but he doesn’t think its still as important?
Because if it were true, it would, indeed, be a Big Hairy Ass Deal. Worthy of massive attention and forceful action and yet…he is strangely silent. Can you tell us why? Can you even make something up that would be remotely plausible? It would be like someone screaming “Fire!” in a crowded theater and then sitting down to munch popcorn.
Can you explain?
‘not voting’ does not make me ineligible to vote.
These voter roll purges have no other root than white supremacy. Whether it be poll taxes, poll tests, voter IDs, voter roll purges, there is a long history of conservatives (now mostly the Republican party) putting barriers in front of minorities to vote in order to protect their view of white supremacy. Why we are here sipping our lattes pretending otherwise is pretty amusing.
(Aside)
“definitely” and “defiantly” don’t even sound the same. Yet I keep consistently seeing the latter standing for the former online. Jeebus, people, sound it out…
(/Aside)
The inactive-voter purge is a legitimate method of rolls maintenance in absence of universal reporting of moves, deaths, etc. Making it so the clock starts ticking at a mere two years, that is dirty pool, especially if re-registering is made into a hassle.
Of course, someone up earlier mentioned one thing that could helpvget over this matter, namely a universal citizen ID, wwhich would reduce “registration” to a mere change of address form. But the concept gives the vapors to people on both right and left across America.
But what if if were only 1/10 as bad as you estimate? Well, you still would have overstated it by two orders of magnitude. Various studies have shown voter fraud at a rate of something like 2-3 votes out of every 1 million. Some studies show it to be something like 30 votes out of a billion.
Why do we need new voting fraud laws when the existing ones include heavy fines and imprisonment?
The Bush administration beat the bushes to prosecute voter fraud but they couldn’t really find any. Trump has shut the fuck up about prosecuting voter fraud because it was all in his imagination. It’s hard to bring imaginary people to court.
You obviously have missed the entire point of the legal debate in this Supreme Court opinion, haven’t you? :smack:
First of all, once again, I point out that Ohio was following a federal mandate. It is required by federal law (indeed, the very federal law that was in question in the opinion) to purge its voter rolls of inaccurate registrations. That is, it is required to try and remove registrations of voters who no longer reside at the residence they registered under. Ohio said, "if you aren’t voting (for six years!!), and if you aren’t even answering our attempt to find out if you still live there, we think that’s ample evidence you don’t actually live at that address any more. One can argue (I, for example, would) that this is not as accurate a method as one could figure out. But most methods which might be more accurate are probably much more expensive, and in this era of minimalized government, it’s no shock that they chose a cheap, easy to accomplish option.
Do you have some crystal ball that lets you know what Ohio’s officials were thinking when they did this? You have a personal chat with John Husted? Perhaps emails that you can point to to support your thesis as to the reason to do this? No? Ok, then you are merely speculating. And you may be right. But do please keep in mind that they were required to do SOMETHING about the issue, and not shockingly, from a Constitutional standpoint (which is the only thing at issue in this CASE), they don’t have to pick the best option.
If everyone voted by mail like we do in Washington, all addresses would have to be correct or folks wouldn’t receive their ballots. But I guess this is just too damned easy and wouldn’t exclude any eligible voters so it can’t be considered.
Well, he’s right, isn’t he? Per the DOJ:
So what we’re really debating is the postcard. To you, it seems like enough of a distinction to say that we’re not kicking people off the rolls just for not voting. To others, it seems like more of a trivial technicality - that the distinction between getting kicked off the rolls for not voting, versus getting kicked off the rolls for not voting, and not noticing a postcard after missing one election early on, seems like close enough to zero difference as to make no never mind.
Obviously that part’s a matter of opinion, and the Supremes have handed down their (determinative) opinion that agrees with yours. But I hope you can at least see why a lot of people (including four Supreme Court justices) disagree.
Unless the DOJ has it wrong, the six years!! doesn’t matter. Infinity years doesn’t matter.
Here’s what the DOJ says about the NVRA requirement for maintenance of the voter registration lists:
Well, it’s required to make a reasonable effort to purge the rolls of inaccurate registrations. Let’s not overstate the legal burden on poor Ohio.
Heavens to Murgatroid, that’s a capital crime to be sure. Why, this citizen is so irresponsible that he should never be allowed to vote again!
Listen, folks, all this talk about registration and roll purging is but a distraction from the real issue, which is to allow any eligible voter to vote when and if he wants to while eliminating fraud. If there was a mechanism that permitted any eligible voter to step up and cast one and only one ballot, we could dump this whole stupid registration process.
With computers and modern communication, there no reason why this can’t happen. One person, one voting access number. You vote once, your number is flagged so you can’t vote again in the election. Furthermore, it would be possible for the computer to know, based on your number, which ballot to give you and which races you could vote for, even for absentee voting. But I doubt if the GOPers would allow it because it would make it harder to manipulate the votes.
I used to be in favor of compulsory voting (obviously with an “abstain” option).
Now, I’m pretty sure that if we instituted something like that, we’d almost immediately start seeing it used as yet another way to punish the underclasses.
Forgot to vote and can’t pay the fine, get arrested on a “routine” traffic stop, get your car seized until you pay usurious towing storage fees, get your license suspended so you can’t get to work, end up with $2000 in “prosecution fees” paid to some private law firm that partnered with the city, and so on.
No. This citizen has either: 1) indicated that he’s not interested in voting or 2) more likely (given the failure to return the card asking him to verify his continued residence at that address) moved. Hence, the citizen is removed from the voting rolls. This only becomes a problem if a) the citizen hasn’t moved, b) the citizen decides finally to vote, and c) the citizen isn’t allowed to re-register at the moment of discovering the removal (presumably while trying to obtain a ballot). This, of course, is easily fixed with on-the-spot registration and provisional balloting.
And, once again, you’re MISSING THE POINT: the case wasn’t about what was the best way to do it; the case was about whether the method chosen was constitutional.