ACLU assails even limited Nebraska voter ID bill

According to reporting of the Lincoln Journal-Star, even a ID bill limited to voters who register by mail without ever seeing an election official is taboo to the ACLU.  The ACLU is not concerned with absentee ballot fraud or any other fraud.
“Not only would many Nebraskans’ constitutional right to vote be limited if the voter ID bill were to be passed, taxpayer dollars would be wasted trying to prevent a problem which doesn’t exist,” said Amy Miller, legal director for the Nebraska chapter of the ACLU in testimony before the Government, Military and Veterans Affairs Committee.
The committee discussed three measures by Omaha Sen. Bob Krist that are part of a Voter Integrity Project being touted by Secretary of State John Gale.  The one (LB662) that caught the ACLU’s attention is aimed at increasing the integrity of the election process by addressing two areas that are at higher risk for potential fraud, Krist said.

Among other things, the bill would amend current identification requirements for first-time voters who register by mail. Now, the law lists several forms of acceptable identification, including utility bills and bank statements.

“As these types of documents are more easily altered or forged, LB662 would eliminate such items as appropriate identification for first-time voters that register by mail,” Krist said. “Various forms of government identification documents from federal, state or local agencies containing the applicant’s name and address would still be allowed.”

Miller would have none of it.

North Carolina redistricting by GOP legislature still not discriminatory – 2014 elections will not be delayed

The North Carolina Supreme Court will not delay federal congressional races this year.  

Lawyers representing the state and Republican legislative leaders had asked the justices to reject the injunction request, saying it was filed too late and that the three Superior Court judges had found the plans “are constitutional in all respects.”

The big difference now compared to 2002, said Rep. David Lewis, R-Harnett and the House’s redistricting chief, is that a trial judge in 2002 had found the legislative districts drawn by Democrats as unconstitutional.

“This situation is exactly the opposite,” Lewis said in an interview, calling the injunction request a “frivolous attempt” to delay the elections.

Two lawsuits filed in late 2011 want the congressional and legislative maps struck down and redrawn. They allege the boundaries are unconstitutional racial gerrymanders that cluster black voters in districts so that seats around them are more apt to elect Republicans.
Link here.

Fund on Bad Ideas in Presidential Commission Report

“But the report says not one word about state-of-the-art measures that states such as Kansas have adopted to combat absentee fraud — for instance, having the voter include the last few digits of his Social Security number or a copy of a photo ID. It also ignores how hard it would be to integrate election observers into the process as early and absentee voting expand.”  Link at National Review.

“Pennsylvania judge guts voter ID law”


For now.


 


More on the latest Pennsylvania Voter ID ruling, which found several elements of the plaintiffs’ case missing:


 


“The judge said he found no evidence that the voter ID law was passed by Pennsylvania’s Republican-majority legislature with the intention of disenfranchising certain voters who might be more inclined to vote for Democratic candidates.”


 


“Challengers to the law must also present evidence of purposeful discrimination, the judge said. ‘The Court has been presented with and finds no evidence of such purposeful discrimination,’ McGinley said.”


 


Judge McGinley also “ruled against the American Civil Liberties Union and other challengers who asked him to declare that the provisions violated the state and federal constitutional right to equal protection.”


 


Thanks to an incredible stipulation by the office of Democrat Attorney General Kathleen Kane that “the parties are not aware of any incidents of in-person voter fraud in Pennsylvania” (they must’ve not seen this), the state’s case was also missing a key element, according to McGinley. In finding that the state failed to justify the voter ID law with evidence of voter fraud, “the judge seemed to continue to focus a major part of his objections on the red herring of we don’t have records of much voter fraud, so you can’t pass a law to prevent it.”


 


Governor Tom Corbett, who signed voter ID into law in March 2012, has until January 27 to decide whether to appeal the case to Pennsylvania’s Supreme Court.


“Lax Punishment for Voter Fraud”



A closer look at voter fraud crime and lax punishment in South Texas:


 


A CHANNEL 5 NEWS investigation revealed that those caught voting illegally seldom face serious consequences for their actions.  The investigation revealed that people found guilty of casting dozens of illegal votes in the Rio Grande Valley were sentenced to probation and community supervision.


 


“You will find lack of integrity everywhere; it’s not just our area,” Hidalgo County Elections Administrator Yvonne Ramon said.


 


Eric Holder said that voter fraud “rarely, if ever occurs, largely because few people are willing to risk felony charges to influence an election.”  Democrat Virginia state senator Chap Petersen was more emphatic: “Voter fraud isn’t happening. No one would risk a felony conviction to give a politician one more vote.”  Both are wrong. Voter fraud is happening, in part because few fraudsters are in fact risking felony convictions.


 


Video at link.