Category: 2016 Election Audit

2010 Consent decree definition, 3^rd Circuit

The term “ballot security” is defined in the 2009 modification as follows: (3) . . . any program aimed at combatting voter fraud by preventing potential voters from registering to vote or casting a ballot. Such programs include, but are not limited to,6 the compilation of voter challenge lists by use of mailing or reviewing databases maintained by state agencies such as motor vehicle records, social security records, change of address forms, and voter lists assembled pursuant to the HAVA7;

Veasy v Abbott

(Intent finding on Remand from 5th Circuit) https://www.brennancenter.org/sites/default/files/legal-work/2017-04-10_Order_Intent.pdf)

“5. Legislative Drafting History Proponents touted SB 14 as a remedy for voter fraud, consistent with efforts of other states. As previously demonstrated, the evidence shows a tenuous relationship between those rationales and the actual terms of the bill.

NAACP v McCrory

Governor Patrick L. McCrory signed Session Law 2013-381,

13. Voter Information Verification Act, S.L. 2013-381, 2013 N.C. Sess. Laws 1505 (codified as amended in scattered sections of N.C. Gen. Stat.).which required several changes to the state’s voting procedures by 2016.

The law accepted a limited pool of photo IDs for in-person voting, reduced the number of early voting days from seventeen to ten, eliminated same-day registration, eliminated preregistration for sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds, and banned out-of-precinct provisional voting.

Before ratifying the law, the state legislature had requested and considered racial data showing that black Americans disproportionately relied on all of the voting procedures the law eliminated or restricted and disproportionately used forms of identification the law excluded.

Voter ID

These efforts to implement a voter ID program- explicitly and obviously- a ballot security measure which the Republican party has agreed not to participate in. Further difficulties in obtaining specific or strict ID’s does represent a real restriction on poor folks. Plaintiff would be required upon changing addresses- to travel to his birth place, across several states, pay for it and back, again, for one identification point necessary to obtain an ID that would work even in relatively non-strict voter ID states. The cost would be approximately $120 dollars.  For women who changed their name, the birth certificate itself might need to be changed, after a name change requiring in person trips to multiple locations, sometimes in different states, and thus possibly in the realm of $200+ dollars.

Here is an incomplete list of the Federal cases which are expressly ballot security initiatives in 2013-2016

                                One Wisconsin Institute v. Thomsen

Feldman v. Arizona

Lee v. Virginia Board of Elections

Common Cause v. Rucho

Ohio A. Philip Randolph Institute and NEOCH v. Husted

League of Women Voters v. Newby

North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP v. The North Carolina State Board of Elections

Florida Democratic Party v. Detzner

Common Cause v. Kemp

Shelby vs Holder

Crosscheck

Kris Kobach of Kansas, is unquestionably a Republican and should be considered one for the sake of comparison to the Consent Decree.  The initiation of the Crosscheck program in 2013- with several other Republican Secretaries of State- ostensibly to prevent the dubious threat of double voting-  is clearly a ballot security initiative, creating voter challenge lists. It eventually grew to 29 states, 100 million records, and 7.2 million matches on their list.   To be clear- at every level of the court system- by Democratic and Republican appointed judges alike have questioned the validity of wide spread voter fraud-  an issue never demonstrated to be of valid or compelling state interest.   Instead, it seems to be a rebranded mode of the same voter caging techniques used in the original Consent Decree and an area they agreed- multiple times- to stop.

It also put the voting records of no less than 100 Million Americans in the hands of an individual who has repeatedly ignored court orders. At a time when it is believed that campaigns microtargeted Facebook users, using illegally obtained data.. this is a question mark that should be examined.