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If you live in OH, PA, CO, FL, you are going to have to protect your right to vote
If you live in Ohio, in Pennsylvania, in Colorado, in Florida, you are going to have to protect your right to vote from state officials who are seeking to deny you the right. I don’t know how much plainer I can make it.
I really can’t stress enough that you are on your own in the listed states. The Obama Justice Department has been the most aggressive on voter protection issues in my memory, but most of election law is state law. I’m going to repeat that again, because it’s the key to the whole thing. Most election law is state law. I wish it were different, but it’s not. We don’t have a lot of tools available in federal law to combat these sorts of suppression efforts.
My advice is this: go local. Call your county Board of Elections (or the equivalent) and ask if you are still registered to vote, what you are required to bring to vote a regular ballot (NOT a provisional ballot) and how you may qualify under any of the new requirements for voting. Get a name and then write that name down. If there’s a dispute you’ll need to know the name of the person who gave you the information. Be polite and remember that local career employees of these state agencies had absolutely nothing to do with the ALEC-written voter suppression laws.
Don’t give up until someone gives you an answer. The one and only advantage you have over these GOP state leaders and election officials is time. It will be too late on election day and there are no do-overs. Remember what happens if Pennsylvania’s election system falls apart. A Supreme Court Justice with a lifetime appointment will petulantly demand that you “get over it.”
http://www.balloon-juice.com/2012/08/30/go-local/
I really can’t stress enough that you are on your own in the listed states. The Obama Justice Department has been the most aggressive on voter protection issues in my memory, but most of election law is state law. I’m going to repeat that again, because it’s the key to the whole thing. Most election law is state law. I wish it were different, but it’s not. We don’t have a lot of tools available in federal law to combat these sorts of suppression efforts.
My advice is this: go local. Call your county Board of Elections (or the equivalent) and ask if you are still registered to vote, what you are required to bring to vote a regular ballot (NOT a provisional ballot) and how you may qualify under any of the new requirements for voting. Get a name and then write that name down. If there’s a dispute you’ll need to know the name of the person who gave you the information. Be polite and remember that local career employees of these state agencies had absolutely nothing to do with the ALEC-written voter suppression laws.
Don’t give up until someone gives you an answer. The one and only advantage you have over these GOP state leaders and election officials is time. It will be too late on election day and there are no do-overs. Remember what happens if Pennsylvania’s election system falls apart. A Supreme Court Justice with a lifetime appointment will petulantly demand that you “get over it.”
http://www.balloon-juice.com/2012/08/30/go-local/
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