A new report released yesterday by the Advancement Project finds that laws in 23 states have the potential of barring more than 10 million Latino United States citizens from voting in the 2012 elections. The report explains why three types of state laws have been passed to suppress Latino voters in states where they constitute a large proportion of the population: Voter purges, proof of citizenship requirements, and photo ID laws. The study argues why Latino and “communities of color” are most likely to be barred from voting because of these laws. In a conference call on Monday, director of Advancement Project’s Voter Protection Program, Katerine Culliton-González, argued that these “voter-suppression” laws are being passed by politicians who are scared of Latinos’ voting power.
“The types of voter restrictions and Jim Crow laws that have been primarily been targeted against African-Americans in the past, have also been revitalized this year,” Ms. Culliton-González said. “There’s a new wave of voter suppression against African-Americans; but this year in particular, we’ve also seen a new wave targeting Latinos, and I think that’s because of the rising political power of the community.”
The study argues why Latino and “communities of color” are most likely to be barred from voting. These groups constitute a large part of eligible voters who may be purged from voter registration rolls in 16 states. Census data shows that 1.1 million Latino naturalized citizens lived in these states.
“More than 75% of the total naturalized citizens in these 16 states were people of color,” the report reads. “During the same five-year period, Latino naturalized citizens made up 51% of all naturalized citizens in the state of Florida and 62% of naturalized citizens in New Mexico—two of the states that are pursuing citizenship purges.”
The report cited a voter purge in Florida that was conducted in April 2012. The state purged people off their voter list that identified themselves as immigrant noncitizens when they applied for their driver’s licenses. The state then realized, nonetheless, that people who were purged may have become naturalized citizens after they obtained their licenses. The state sent 2,600 voters letters requiring them to produce additional documentation to prove that they were eligible voters. Latinos, African-Americans, and Asian-Americans comprised at least 82 percent of those 2,600 people on the Florida purge list.
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“In Miami-Dade County, where most of the targeted voters live, more than 98% of 562 people who responded to notice letters proved that they were indeed eligible U.S. citizens and thus mistakenly placed on the purge list,” the report reads.
The report also shows how a state law in Arizona, where Latinos comprise 48.27 percent of the Naturalized Citizen Population, was followed by 31,000 rejected voter registration forms between 2005 and 2007. A federal Court of Appeals ruled that the Arizona law “was pre-empted by the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).”
“The NVRA was enacted to increase voter registration in the United States by making it easier, not more difficult, to register to vote,” the report reads. “Arizona has petitioned for review by the U.S. Supreme Court.”
The report argues that in 14 states where legislation requiring proof of citizenship, Latinos have a higher proportion of people living in poverty than any other ethnic group. Among poverty-stricken factors like relying on public transportation, it becomes more difficult for Latinos to obtain such documentation to prove citizenship, making it less likely for them to vote.
The report also cites that in states like Pennsylvania where laws require citizens to have a state-issued ID to vote, people have to produce “up to four underlying forms of identification to prove legal presence, identity, and residency.” CNBC host Jim Cramer tweeted that his father wouldn’t be able to vote because “he does not drive, he is elderly, and can’t prove his citizenship.” A study by the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO found that 1.6 million voters or 20 percent of all registered voters in Pennsylvania had no ID or an expired ID. The Advancement Project report found that a greater proportion of Latinos don’t have state-issued IDs than non-Hispanic white people.
“It is estimated that 16 percent of Latinos do not possess a requisite photo identification compared to six percent of nonHispanic Whites,” the report reads.
The report also states that these laws have been passed to minimize voter fraud. The number of cases of voter fraud which are used to justify these laws are very small, nonetheless. The commonwealth of Pennsylvania signed a stipulation attesting that they found zero instances of voter fraud. News21 contacted election officers in all 50 states, requesting every case of voter fraud.
“Analysis of the resulting comprehensive News21 election fraud database turned up 10 cases of voter impersonation,” the report reads. “With 146 million registered voters in the United States during that time, those 10 cases represent one out of about every 15 million prospective voters.”
Co-Director of the Advancement Project, Judith Browne Dianis states that their report exposes tactics employed by presidential candidate Mitt Romney supporters to suppress voters who are more likely to vote for President Barack Obama.
“These laws and the policies around purges are part of a bigger effort on the part of some politicians to manipulate the laws and the policies for their own partisan gain,” Ms. Brown Dianis said. “You could see from the target of Latino voters in particular kind of corresponds to what we see in the polls in terms of support for President Obama. That support has been strong and continues to be strong in most recent polling, so we have seen politicians seeking to suppress the votes of Latinos to make gains for themselves and for their party.”
A recent Latino Decisions Poll found that 74 percent of Latinas prefer President Barack Obama while only 21 percent prefer Governor Mitt Romney. A whopping 53 point margin.
There is nothing wrong with requiring a voter ID.
HOWEVER
There IS something wrong with implementing this new law 9 months before a presidential election. If voter fraud was so rampant in the last election, why didn’t the GOP rush to pass this law immediately after the 2008 election? Wait until the 2016 election to impose this, that way it will give people 4 years to get their act together, and THEN you can give them the ‘you have no excuse’ treatment.
Watch the video and sign the petition to end Voter Suppression.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9TjVsQa57c
Agreed. Many Latin American Countries require you to have a picture voter ID, so they should not be strangers to it.
However, it smells of attempted sabotage this close to election. But since the majority of people who are in power are not affected, they won’t do anything about it.
At least somebody is finally standing up to this bullshit: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5OdQGbVNa4
The only time voter fraud was rampant was when Bush won in 2004. Diebold rigged the machines so only one outcome was possible. Loser wins.
Actually, there is something wrong with being required to show an ID. First of all, if you have to pay to get the ID, or any supporting documents, that could be construed as a poll tax, which is illegal under the Voting Rights Act.
Secondly, any ID can be challenged by a poll worker. If the poll worker thinks your ID is fradulent, you will be asked to cast a “provisional” ballot. Provisional ballots can be challenged bya good lawyer and thrown out, even if the ID you provided is valid. I
There is something wrong with voter ID. We learned about it in middle school. Why didn’t you?
What I got out of it, is that a huge majority of latino are ILLEGAL. The laws are these to prevent them from voting when they shouldnt because they are not citizens. As it should be. The fact that someone has a driver’s license in any of the 50 united states, doesnt make them a citizen. And just to put it into perspective for you, I AM LATINO. My family is from Argentina, and yes I AM A CITIZEN, therefore I can vote.
Here is what the constitution says:
The United States Constitution, in Article VI, section 3, states that “no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.” The Constitution, however, leaves the determination of voting qualifications to the individual states. Over time, the federal role in elections has increased through amendments to the Constitution and enacted legislation, such as the Voting Rights Act of 1965.[1] At least four of the fifteen post-Civil War constitutional amendments were ratified specifically to extend voting rights to different groups of citizens. These extensions state that voting rights cannot be denied or abridged based on the following:
•Birth – “All persons born or naturalized” “are citizens” of the U.S. and the U.S. State where they reside (14th Amendment, 1868)
•”Race, color, or previous condition of servitude” – (15th Amendment, 1870)
•”On account of sex” – (19th Amendment, 1920)
•In Washington, D.C., presidential elections after 164 year suspension by U.S. Congress (23rd Amendment, 1961)
•(For federal elections) “By reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax” – (24th Amendment, 1964)
•(For state elections) Taxes – (Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections, 383 U.S. 663 (1966))
•”Who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of age” (26th Amendment, 1971).
http://www.usa.gov/Citizen/Topics/Voting.shtml states:
Voter Eligibility To be eligible to vote, you must be a U.S. citizen. In most states, you must be 18 years old to vote, but some states do allow 17-year-olds to vote. States also have their own residency requirements to vote. For additional information about state-specific requirements and voter eligibility, contact your state election office.
So how is this a “Jim Crow” Type Voter-Suppression? Most of the Latinos here that cannot produce IDs or proof of citizenship are illegal. The article is rediculous, plus inacurate as well, and posted on some fly-by-night blog? Give me a break.
Dude, did the GOP voting commission pay you for that comment, or are you a freelance whacko?
I think ECanale made some good points. It seems like these laws are not going to stop any legal U.S. citizens from voting. However it seems from your comment that you disagree with him. I would like to hear your reasons why, not just an insult.
>”these laws are not going to stop any legal U.S. citizens from voting”
Did you even bother to read the article? Yes, it really IS going to stop a lot of legals from voting. It specifically said 98% of Latinos on voter purge lists were in fact legal.
And it’s not just Latinos. Women who get married or divorced often do not have ID’s that exactly match their new names. A recent report shows that such women number about 32 million in this country.
I think the issue here is that they require people to produce up to four pieces of identification to prove they are citizens. FOUR! Could you produce four pieces to prove you are a citizen? I could produce a birth certificate but that’s about it as a driver’s license doesn’t count.
Plus if you have to pay for all four pieces of ID, that’s the equivalent of a poll tax. What are the four pieces of ID? I’m guessing birth certificate, passport, social security card, and I can’t think of a fourth. So you have to get a passport even if you never travel outside of the country and have no intention of ever doing so? In ten years the Republicans will be asking for a fingerprint, retina scan, full body search….
And E Canale, the majority of Latinos, especially adults, are American citizens just like you. There is no evidence of illegal immigrants voting in our elections.
Will you drive me to the DMV, pay me for my time off work, and pay for all the documents I need to buy in order to vote? Or should I just not bother to vote so that I can eat through the end of the month?
An illegal immigrant may be able to get a driver’s license, although that has become difficult, but they are NOT allowed to register to vote. So illegals are not the issue at all.
The research utilized to decide how to eliminate legal Latino voters showed that most often, immigrants get a driver’s license when they’re carrying a green card and then when they become citizens, they still carry that license until it expires. So by using driver licensing data, the states come up with lists of people who are legal voters, people who could not have registered to vote with the naturalization papers, but whose driver licenses don’t reflect that. In other words, it’s KNOWN that they’re citizens because they’re legally registered to vote but they’re purging them anyway. Note in the article that in Miami-Dade 98% of those purged who responded to the letters were naturalized citizens duly registered to vote. It’s very clear to everyone that these voter purges are intended to stop Latino voters from voting for Democrats.
So, because they’re Latinos, they’re illegal immigrants?
There isn’t anything wrong with requiring Voter ID, as long as free or nearly free voter IDs are widely available.
The argument about Republicans rushing this through last minute before the elections is often moot, however. Texas passed their voter ID law during the last session which concluded mid 2011. Since then, Democrats have had the law tied up with challenges in the court system.
That’s a big “if”. Not only are photo IDs hardly ever free (therefore making their requirement an effective poll tax), but those who don’t own cars (senior citizens for example) cannot easily get to the centers that issue them. I really wish everyone responding would think before they say there is “nothing wrong” with requiring photo ID. NOT EVERYONE HAS OR NEEDS ONE.
When was the first time you voted? Do you remember what you did? You provided the election commission your name, your address, your party affiliation and your social security number and they sent you a voter registration card with your polling place. Now in order for you to commit voter fraud, you’d have to know the persons name you were pretending to be and their address and you’d have to get there before they did and you’d be risking jail time to provide your candidate with one additional vote (if that person was not planning on voting for the same guy). It’s simply not logical and you are parroting the illogical platform of your party. You fit right in Einstein.
Neal,
The title of this article is so disingenuous. Nothing in this article demonstrates that Latino voters will be denied the opportunity to vote. As you pointed out, more than 98% of voters in Miami-Dade County took the responsibility to make sure they can vote. This proves that those who take responsibilty for themselves will not be denied the capability to vote. Bottom line is be responsible for your self.
How can I be responsible if the Republicans have taken away my right to vote? Is it really my fault for being the victim here? You can bet that as soon as I get enough money to vote I will always be voting against the Republicans.
Ok….if requiring an ID to vote infringes on my right to vote….Then logically requiring an ID to purchase a firearm infringes on my second amendment rights.
Until you can kill someone with a vote, your analogy is full of holes.
No, because voting is not the same as buying a weapon – something that can potentially kill someone. It’s also not the same as driving a car, or buying alcohol for similar reasons. Your logic is therefore not really, well, logic because it purports a false equivalency.
Good scare tactic….full of lies, innuendo and half-truths. Makes this site a stooge for the kook Left. Funny how my wife who has kept her Hispanic surname has no problem what so ever, as do all the other US citizens of Latino descent. Maybe this will keep the non-US citizens from voting in this election unlike the 2008. Well, except for Chicago where the dead Latino non-citizens vote each election.l
The conservative government tof Puerto Rico declared invalid all birth certificates issued there before 2010. So guess what? If you don’t have a photo ID and need your birth certificate to get one and you were born in Puerto Rico, you’re out of luck. (Puerto Ricans born on the island are automatically US citizens.)
http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2012/08/16/pennsylvania-voter-id-ruling-may-hurt-puerto-ricans-most
I’m going to go ahead and say this article giving the voter ID laws the same weight as the Jim Crow laws is a bit laughable but let’s be real here. There were 10 cases of voter fraud from the last election. Not 10%, 10. This is not nearly enough to even pretend there’s an issue with voter fraud. So the next logical question is why would they start making these laws if there’s no real issue in the first place?
It’s very clear this is an effort to reduce votes for Obama. This video is pretty much proof so I don’t know why people aren’t treating this like the cheating this is
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EuOT1bRYdK8&feature=player_embedded
In So Dakota it was orchestrated by the conservative 2/1 majority to keep the 28,000 mostly poor native Americans from voting