Obama Campaign Grapples With New Voter ID Laws

[ellisonz]

By MICHAEL D. SHEAR
Published: April 29, 2012

WASHINGTON — Field workers for President Obama’s campaign fanned across the country this weekend in an effort to confront a barrage of new voter identification laws that strategists say threaten the campaign’s hopes for registering new voters ahead of the November election.

In Wisconsin, where a new state law requires those registering voters to be deputized in each of the state’s 1,800 municipalities, the campaign sent a team of trainers armed with instructions for complying with the new regulations.

In Florida, the campaign’s voter registration aides traveled across the state to train volunteers on a new requirement that voter registration signatures be handed into state officials within 48 hours after they are collected.

And in Ohio, Mr. Obama’s staff members are beginning outreach to let voters know about new laws that discourage precinct workers from telling voters where to go if they show up at the wrong precinct.

More: NYTimes Story

Grand Old Cheater Party IMHO

[No Elephants]

1. Rank and file Democrats have for years asked for federal election laws to govern federal elections.

Elected Democrats. It is not as though no one saw this and other attempts to muck with elections coming.

Elected Democrats pretty much ignored us.

Reap, sow.


ETA: Actually, "saw it coming" is wildly inaccurate. They've been mucking with elections for years.

[ellisonz]

2. If I remember my Constitution...

...the right to govern elections is given to the states.

[No Elephants]

3. I don't think that can be correct.

There have been plenty of federal laws on voting, including a number of Voting Rights Acts and the Help America Vote Act.

The states hold elections, but I don't know of anything that says that the federal government cannot enact legislation to make sure elections held by the states comport with the Constitution of the United States.

There may be other issues, like whether the federal requirements would make the states spend more money on elections, but that is a separate issue and can be resolved by throwing money at it.

But, if you have a specific section to cite, please cite it.

[Divine Discontent]

4. well, it's valid up to a point. The US govt certainly wouldn't approve a state

(Ohio) running the vote tabulations through the same company's servers that are used by the RNC, like they did in 2004. So, in some ways the manner in which the elections are done is determined by the states (where the booths go, times, early voting, etc), but who can vote you would THINK is determined fully by the gov't, but, the GOP keeps voting through state legislatures all these added on roadblocks to voting... I wish the Justice Dept, or whoever, would get this fixed once and for all - that the votes are all done over the course of a week, and not all this BS the states are doing.



Get it here --->>>
www.zazzle.com/youre_not_in_the_1_why_vote_like_you_are...

[No Elephants]

7. The feds have been asked often enough, esp. after 2000 and 2004. They'e chosen not to act.

And, in 2006, the Democrats could easily have done so.

So, when they start moaning about the big bad state Republicans, it seems to me like just more kabuki.

[Divine Discontent]

15. exactly! n/t

[ellisonz]

5. It's complex.

Article 1, Section 4, Clause 1.

The times, places and manner of holding elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each state by the legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by law make or alter such regulations, except as to the places of choosing Senators.

Article 2, Section 1, Clause 2.

Each state shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors, equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or person holding an office of trust or profit under the United States, shall be appointed an elector.

Couple that with 1st, 10th and 14th Amendments and it makes for interesting case law.

[No Elephants]

6. Not really. Neither of those clauses prohibits Congress from enacting laws to ensure

that elections are being held consistent with the Constitution of the United States.

"Time, place and manner" refer to details, like hours of election and what the ballot looks like and where the poll is/are, not fundamental Constitutional rights--and the Constitution even expressly gave Congress the right to alter those details.

Surely, you are not suggesting that the ability to decide details like the time, place and manner of voting, unless Congress says otherwise, gives states the right to violate the Constitution, say by prohibiting Asians from voting?

And again, many federal voting acts have already been passed.
S
ETA: Assuming, of course, that the Asians are U.S. citizens and otherwise entitled to vote.

[ellisonz]

8. Correct.

However, if you want to get the States to actually do something, you're going to need a Federal judge.

[No Elephants]

9. You mean, if Congress enacts a law and the states refuse to honor it?

Then, a writ of mandamus would be necessary? Is that what you mean?

Depends on the wording of the law. The law could, for example, include federal supervisors of state elections.

And, if the punishments on the individuals who were responsible for the violations of federal law are harsh enough--and prosecuted often enough-- I suspect there would be fewer violations and isn't that worthwhile?

Besides, when a law is disobeyed, isn't a judge usually involved at some point?

But, if that's what you mean, isn't the first step enacting the law?

And doesn't that get us back full circle to my reply #1?

[ellisonz]

10. Yes.

But we both agree it comes down to the Courts to implement such provisions.

[No Elephants]

12. That is not what I said, but it is a side issue anyway.

My point was and remains an extremely simple one:

If you don't enact voting rights laws as your constituents have begged you to do, don't complain if the absence of voting rights laws is a problem for you when you run for re-election.

[KoKo]

11. It's a little late "to the party" given that after the 2010 Mid-Terms...so much was given away

by a horrible DNC Chair and a lackluster effort by the Incoming President with a Mandate to recognize the DANGER of not having a STRONG DNC CHAIR with BACKBONE...

They thought the RW would be their Friends? They were too involved in the Financial Crisis?


I remember "Center for American Progress" (our great new LIBERAL THINK TANK) assuring those of us who were on their Web Site who subscribed to them...telling us "everything is under control..this will not be our last President's Election where he was scrambling.....BECAUSE ...we've got Obama's Election all under control and the RW will never be able to To TOUCH HIM." (This is a paraphrase but, it's what I heard from them and (at that time) they WERE OUR LIBERAL THINK TANK who gave HUGE ASSURANCES TO US...that "AFTER BUSH...We've LEARNED."

They either miscalculated, were deceiving us...or were smoking Crack!

[No Elephants]

13. I know you are being sarcastic, but for the record: CAP is far from liberal.

[KoKo]

14. I did believe them...I thought this New Think Tank was for US..the Liberals....

Yes...I was definitely innocent...but, I wasn't clueless.

I never thought our Dem Party would stoop this low. So yes...I was gullible.

[No Elephants]

16. Ease up on yourself, Koko. We weren't supposed to catch on that

Turd Way really meant one way, the Republican way or, at best, some half-assed triangulating that neither side really wants (e.g., gays CAN be in the military, after all, as long as they are deceptive about being gay).

I know someone who was a summa cum laude graduate of Barnard. She was in the top 3 in her class, and it has always bothered her that she did not know where in the top 3 she fell. (I have a hunch that is because she believes she came in first.)

She watches the news on TV every day and also reads 2 or 3 newspapers a day, every day. She also subscribes to a ton of magazines.

Although she had voted Democratic in all national elections all her adult life, she has on occasion voted Republican in a local election. (Alas.)

She did feel, however, that Democrats had become "phony."

So, if Ms. Newspaper and Magazine Reading, TV New Watching, Barnard Summa did not know about the change in the Party, there can't be much shame in not knowing.

As for me, I learned about it only after I started posting on DU.

It's ironic. I've seen a lot of people post that they learned what had happened to their Party only after lurking or posting at DU.

Anyway, Republicans insist on using liberal and Democrat interchangeably and some Democrats have been imitating the Republicans in that. But the terms "liberal" and "Democrat" are not interchangeable and the term "progressive" is used nowadays mostly to disguise.

The example I keep giving is Will Marshall who was a founding member of the DLC and one of its first two employees, the other being founder Al From. Marshall also signed the 2003 PNAC memo. And then, he went on to found the Progressive Policy Institute, which he still heads. Throughtout, he maintained a close relationship with the DLC.

I think many rank and file Democrats who describe themselves as "progressive" would be surprised to know that a signer of the PNAC memo has become Mr. "Progressive" Policy.