Popper: Kansas Registration Rational and Legal

“Kansas’ decision to implement a two-tiered system for voter registration is a rational—and perfectly legal—response to a lawless situation that it did not create. Its decision must be understood within the larger context of the ongoing battle between the Obama administration and the states over the enforcement of both our immigration laws and our election integrity laws.”

Jurist.

Kansas, Arizona challenge Election Commission on citizenship verification of registration

Arizona and Kansas have rekindled a lawsuit seeking to force the U.S. Election Assistance Commission to require residents to show proof of citizenship when registering to vote, arguing that a recent agency decision to deny the requests was unlawful. In a filing late Friday in a case with broad implications for voting rights, the two states asked U.S. District Judge Eric Melgren to order federal officials to include state-specific requirements in federal voter registration forms.   More here. 

“The Obama Administration moves to silence 501(C)(4) organizations”

Powerline provides much needed sunshine:  “A key provision is that a 501(c)(4) organization cannot engage in any activity that mentions a candidate for office or a political party within 60 days of a general election. The regulation is facially neutral as between conservative and liberal groups, but its effect will fall overwhelmingly on conservative organizations…”


…So for the Obama administration, it’s an easy calculation: 501(c)(4) groups are conservative by a margin of more than six to one, so let’s just knock them all out of action. Doing so will have no impact on the Democrats’ major funding source, the unions, since they are 501(c)(5) organizations. 

“Wall Street Journal on the Bad Voting Bill”

Via the Corner, Roger Clegg summarizes the Wall Street Journal editorial that is making an impact on the debate.

The Journal notes that “the liberal goal is to give national politicians more power to play racial politics in a few unfavored states”; that the new bill’s scheme to keep some states in federal receivership “fails to take into account broader racial progress in all of those states”; and that the bill’s use of an “effects” test raises constitutional problems and is “an open door to political abuse that is a specialty of this Administration.” All true, as is the editorial’s conclusion: that the Voting Right Act’s current provisions “provide ample federal enforcement when local politicians limit minority rights,” and so the preclearance mechanism does not need to be resurrected.