A Black Man Brought 3 Forms of ID to the Polls in Wisconsin. He Still Couldn’t Vote.

[babylonsister]

SO WRONG!


A Black Man Brought 3 Forms of ID to the Polls in Wisconsin. He Still Couldn’t Vote.

Now, Eddie Lee Holloway is suing—and a federal court just agreed with him.
By Ari Berman
Today 2:54 pm



Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker said his state’s strict new voter-ID requirement worked “just fine” in the April 5 primary, but thousands of Wisconsinites were unable to cast a ballot because of the new law. One of them was Eddie Lee Holloway Jr.

Holloway, a 58-year-old African-American man, moved from Illinois to Wisconsin in 2008 and voted without problems, until Wisconsin passed its voter-ID law in 2011. “I never miss voting,” he said. He brought his expired Illinois photo ID, birth certificate, and Social Security card to get a photo ID for voting, but the DMV in Milwaukee rejected his application because the name on his birth certificate read “Eddie Junior Holloway,” the result of a clerical error when it was issued.

Holloway, who worked as a cook in Illinois but is now unemployed and disabled, living with his family in Milwaukee, got a ride downtown to the Vital Records System to try to fix his birth certificate. Vital Records said it would cost between $400 and $600, which Holloway could not afford.

He then called the Illinois Vital Records Division, who said he had to personally come to Springfield, the state capitol, to amend his birth certificate. So Holloway bought a $180 round-trip bus ticket and traveled four hours back to his home state. Once in Springfield, the division said it needed a copy of his high-school and vaccination records. Holloway went to his hometown of Decatur to get his school records, paying $20 to his friend for gas money, but after returning to Springfield, Vital Records said it needed his full Social Security statement, which he didn’t have. He also visited the Illinois DMV, but had no luck there either. He left Illinois without getting the documents he needed to vote in Wisconsin.

Back in Milwaukee, Holloway got two copies of his Social Security statement and asked Illinois Vital Records if he could e-mail or fax them over. They said he’d have to appear in person again. But Holloway didn’t have the money to make another trip to Illinois and gave up trying to get a voter ID. He’d spent $200, visited two states, and made seven trips to different public institutions, but still couldn’t vote in Wisconsin.

more...

https://www.thenation.com/article/a-black-man-brought-3-forms-of-id-to-the-polls-in-wisconsin-he-still-couldnt-vote/

[msongs]

1. illegal poll tax. too bad dems did not get rid of walker and the legislature nt

[Jackie Wilson Said]

53. Good thing this didnt happen in Canada or Britain, we would probably send troops.

But it happened here where racism is not just tolerated it is expected.

[Roland99]

95. EXACTLY! $400-600 for a new birth certificate?? WTF??

To fix a clerical typo????

[Mariana]

116. It cost more than $100 to correct my stepkid's BC in North Carolina

and took more than six months. That doesn't include the notary fees that were required because it was done by mail. They had mistyped her father's age. Normally this particular error would never be a problem, but she's a dual citizen, and when she applied for a passport from his country of origin, they would not issue the passport until the discrepancy was fixed.

I thought that was ridiculous, but $400-600 is mind-blowing - especially when THEY made the mistake in the first place!

[lagomorph777]

2. So yes, Walker was right: Voter ID works "just fine"

This is exactly what it's meant to do.

[sus453]

40. Just like he intended.

[dchill]

54. Yep. A well-oiled machine.

[elljay]

99. Hope it kept one of those illegal Mexican

rapists with calves like cantaloupes from voting. It sure was effective with U. S. citizens!

[think]

3. This is or should be a national disgrace. My sympathies go out to Mr. Holloway. /nt

[Agnosticsherbet]

4. Walker's law worked like he intended.

We need to elect Democrats

[spanone]

5. this is criminal.

[malaise]

60. and then some

:fistbunp:

[spanone]

68. it makes me crazy...how can we allow this in a democracy?

[Elmer S. E. Dump]

72. And unfortunately, it's Wisconsin.

Born in Madison, 1954, lived here all my life. Very liberal city. But somehow republizards have taken control of state government. Right now, we are effectively fucked.

[spanone]

74. tennessee here, it galls me when i have to show my i.d. to vote

at the polling place, they take your picture i.d., and ask you what your address is...bullshit.

[Elmer S. E. Dump]

76. Yeah, I showed them my drivers license - the funny thing (hee hee)

is that the person checking the IDs was my wife. So I'm watching her scrutinize the date, birth date, looking back up at me, back to the card, then looking at me, and handing my card back with a smile.

I acted like I didn't know her either. Not a real exciting story, but it was still kind of funny.

[morningglory]

77. Democrats are more likely to live in apartment buildings.

Also, to move frequently, and it can be likely that they are not still at the address on the drivers license. Big no no. Can't vote.

[progressoid]

6. Fuck.

[mooseprime]

7. this kind of thing

should be a felony in our country

[bjo59]

9. Totally agree with you.

[bjo59]

8. Utterly disgusting. What were Wisconsinites thinking when they re-elected Scott Walker???

(Or were there election shenanigans in play when that guy managed to win the recall vote?) Makes you want to weep, thinking of Eddie Lee Holloway traveling those long distances and paying out all that money and still being denied the right to vote. Bernie has the right idea when he talks about how he will work to change the law to automatically register every US citizen on his or her 18th birthday. This guy's story should make anyone ashamed to call this a free country.

[elleng]

10. 'Yesterday the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit,

which upheld the voter ID law in 2014, ruled that District Court Judge Lynn Adelman (who initially struck down the law) should reexamine the case to provide relief for voters with an “inability to obtain a qualifying photo ID with reasonable effort.” The ACLU estimates that thousands of Wisconsinites fall into that category.

“The right to vote is personal and is not defeated by the fact that 99% of other people can secure the necessary credentials easily,” wrote Judge Frank Easterbrook. (Three hundred thousand registered voters in Wisconsin lack a government-issued photo ID, and many have faced great difficulty obtaining one, as I’ve documented.)

This is a small but important victory against a bad law. “We continue to believe Wisconsin’s voter-ID law should be overturned entirely, but given the Seventh Circuit’s prior ruling, we’re now trying to mitigate the worst aspects of the law,” says Sean Young of the ACLU. Those like Holloway who’ve had many problems obtaining a photo ID should be able to sign an affidavit confirming their identity and cast a regular ballot, the ACLU believes. Other states with voter-ID laws have adopted similar fallback options, although such “soft” voter-ID laws “still leave an uncertain number of voters disenfranchised,” writes Rick Hasen. “These burdens might be justified if there were evidence that state voter-identification laws solve a serious problem, but there is no such evidence.'

[WHEN CRABS ROAR]

17. The main purpose of a law is to correct or solve

a problem, so where is the evidence of of voter fraud?
That's the real question that needs to be asked, where is the problem?

[elleng]

20. Right, where is a 'problem?'

[TDale313]

36. Well, let's be honest...

The "problem" is too many people not voting the way Republicans want. Specifically poor, minorities, young people- all the ones this is most likely to impact.

[elleng]

38. Of course.

[SoapBox]

11. This is fucking criminal.

Americans have the gawd damned RIGHT to vote!

These obstacles placed their way, should be illegal.

[blackspade]

12. Kafkaesque.

These government agencies should be ashamed.
I'm glad the court agreed with him

[elleng]

26. Exactly, KAFKA.

SHAMEFUL!

7th circuit's a good court, and Easterbrook's a good judge.

[dragonlady]

64. All three judges on this panel were appointed by Republicans n/t

[elleng]

66. Which is, often and thankfully, irrelevant.

[oberliner]

13. How is his race relevant?

The headline refers to him being a black man but that does not seem to be pertinent to the article.

[trumad]

16. Because race never matters...

How silly

[oberliner]

22. It does not come up at any point in the article

One would think from the headline that there would be some mention of race or racism in the body of the article.

[babylonsister]

21. They're targeting people who

are more likely not to have the necessary ID and who else would coincidentally vote Dem for the most part.

http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/04/05/will-voter-suppression-skew-wisconsin-primary-results

snip//

In 2012, African-American voters in Wisconsin were 1.7 times as likely as white voters to lack a driver’s license or state photo ID, and Latino voters were 2.6 times as likely as white voters to lack such ID. More than 60 percent of people who’ve requested a photo ID for voting from the DMV have been black or Hispanic, according to legal filings.

The law also targets students. Student IDs from most public and private universities and colleges are not accepted because they don’t contain signatures or a two-year expiration date (compared to a ten-year expiration for driver’s licenses). …

That means many schools, including the University of Wisconsin-Madison, are issuing separate IDs for students to vote, an expensive and time-consuming process for students and administrators. Students who use the new IDs will also have to bring proof of enrollment from their schools, an extra burden of proof that only applies to younger voters.

Students, people of color, older people who will have trouble locating birth certificates … sounds like … Democrats! And of course cutting back on early voting hours – in particular eliminating non-working hours like night and weekend voting – serves one and only one purpose, making it harder to vote.

[oberliner]

23. Understood

I certainly agree with you that the groups you mentioned are most likely to be impacted by these ridiculous rules but I still do not see why the headline identified this person by his race.

This particular article is about the travails of this particular person with race not really playing a role at least as far as what's written in the article.

Reading the headline, one would think that it was a significant component of the story, but it does not come up again outside of the headline.

[pnwmom]

29. The headline identified his race because it's RELEVANT. The law was deliberately

designed to have disparate effects based on race, and this example shows how it's working.

There is no reason for the writer to have to bring up his subject's race more than once, but the connection needed to be made to put this person's experience into the proper context.

[oberliner]

33. It does not appear so from the content of the story

The factors that appear to be most relevant in his case (from what is included in the article) are his being from out of state, his not having a valid drivers license (possibly due to his age), and his not being able to afford all the ridiculous fees necessary to get the requisite forms completed.

[pnwmom]

35. It feels you are being as deliberately obtuse as those who wrote the law

pretending they didn't design it on purpose to suppress minority vote.

I know you're not -- but that's how it seems.

African Americans and Latinos are less likely to have drivers licenses regardless of age. You don't think that's relevant?

http://www.brennancenter.org/sites/default/files/legacy/d/download_file_50902.pdf

1. Minorities and poor populations are the most likely to have drivers license problems. Less than half (47 percent) of Milwaukee County African American adults and 43 percent of Hispanic adults have a valid drivers license compared to 85 percent of white adults in the Balance of State

(BOS, i.e., outside Milwaukee County). The situation for young adults ages 18-24 is even worse -- with only 26 percent of African Americans and 34 percent of Hispanics in Milwaukee County with a valid license compared to 71 percent of young white adults in the Balance of State.

[trumad]

80. Funny...

As I read through most of the threads at DU I'll usually come across a post that makes me go....huh?

Quite often this poster writes the huh post.

[oberliner]

86. I'll take that as a compliment

Huh posts are much more interesting to me as well.

[oberliner]

85. I understand that is the intention

I am just saying that the content of this particular article makes no mention of the person's race having anything to do with the difficulties described. Obviously poverty in Wisconsin disproportionately impacts African-Americans, however the circumstances outlined in the article could apply to poor white people (and probably have). Including the race of the person in question in the headline seems unnecessary for this piece. Another article talking about how much these laws impact the AA community would obviously be different, but this one shows the problems that any low-income person might face.

[CreekDog]

65. your obtuseness notwithstanding

[oberliner]

87. I don't mean to be obtuse

I don't understand why my comment got the reaction that it did. It just seems like the situation described in the OP was not connected to the person's race, except insofar as the fact that African Americans are disproportionately poorer than whites in Wisconsin. But that isn't really what this piece is about. These circumstances could affect any low income person in the state.

[awoke_in_2003]

105. "I don't mean to be obtuse"

you're just a natural?

[oberliner]

106. I think I am making a reasonable point

I have repeatedly expressed understanding about the racial dynamic of the law, I am just asking for people to consider the point I am raising that this article is about issues connected to the law that would impact low income people of any race.

[awoke_in_2003]

107. But it is disproportionately affecting minorities

and bringing up race allows you to highlight the fact that they have gutted the Voting Rights Act, and that it needs to be fixed. Unfortunately, far too few people in this country will rally against the oppression of the poor. More will rally against oppression based on race.

[oberliner]

111. OK, fair enough

That's actually a really good point.

[Kip Humphrey]

30. because black votes matter too.

You got a problem with that?

[oberliner]

31. What a bizarre response

That reply is so out of left field. I am trying to figure what I wrote that could have possibly suggested to you that I might have a problem with black voters mattering.

[pnwmom]

27. Because Voter ID is being used to suppress minority vote, because they often have more trouble

getting the required ID.

There is no doubt that it has a bigger impact on minority voters than on whites, and that this isn't an accident.

[oberliner]

32. I get that

But this particular story is more about the impact on someone who may have moved from another state or who no longer has a valid drivers license (which would be mostly older folks). Those groups would seem to be especially impacted by these laws, and this story illustrates how and why.

[pnwmom]

34. Older people with money wouldn't have been as impacted as those without, and minority

people are also more likely to be lower income.

[oberliner]

88. Yes, that is true

But this article describes a situation that could impact any and all low income people in Wisconsin (most of whom are white incidentally).

[pnwmom]

109. I already gave you the stats. Minority people are much less likely to have drivers licenses,

so this race of this man is extremely relevant to the issue of him not having a voter ID in the first place.

[oberliner]

112. OK

That is a fair point.

[Politicub]

114. Yes, perhaps, but what point are you trying to make?

That poor white people can have issues meeting requirements of voter ID laws, too? Is that it?

This article is the story of one man. It resonates because it highlights, in a very personal way, what this individual had to go through and still wasn't able to vote.

If you want to read an article about a white person having this problem, why don't you write it yourself. You can leave out the animus directed toward minority communities if it makes you feel like you're offering a balanced view. It's your article, after all.

[oberliner]

115. That the article is about the travails of a person whose lack of money hindered his ability to vote

Last edited Thu Apr 14, 2016, 04:00 PM - Edit history (1)

A more accurate headline based on the article would have been: A Poor Man Brought 3 Forms of ID to the Polls in Wisconsin. He Still Couldn’t Vote.

Again, there is nothing in the article about how his race was a factor, but there were several examples of how lack of money was.

There is no animus directed at minority communities coming from me. I am just saying that the article in the OP tells the story of something that happened to a person whose race was not identified as significant anywhere in the article itself, yet that was featured in the headline.

I think it is a very resonant article that does exactly what you said in terms of personalizing the situation.

[roody]

61. How many white people has this happened to?

[oberliner]

89. Probably quite a few

Since 10 percent of whites in Wisconsin live in poverty and the state is about 90 percent white.

[rhett o rick]

70. Right. It's not that the AA community doesn't get unfairly disenfranchised all the time.

What are you thinking?

[oberliner]

90. Of course they do

But this article describes circumstances that impact people who are low income in the state. Ten percent of white people in Wisconsin live in poverty. While that percentage is most lower than the percentage of African Americans in the state who live in poverty, it is higher in terms of actual numbers of people (since Wisconsin is 90 percent white). This is a problem that low income voters in the state could face irrespective of their race.

[treestar]

75. Oh it is

Any one of the bureaucrats along the way could have given in. The law is enforced on its strictest terms if you are black. If white it is the spirit and not the letter of the law.

It should not cost that much to fix the birth certificate either.

[oberliner]

91. That is an interesting point

It could be that a white person would not have been forced to go through the same hoops. I would be curious to know if that is the case, even via anecdotal evidence from the state.

I would point out, though, that this particular article does not claim or even imply that that is the case.

[RobinA]

97. I've Got To Disagree

I am a social worker and part of my job is getting people birth certificates, SS cards and IDs. There are more and more hoops to be jumped through no matter what race you are. Might it disparately affect one race? Yes. But the rules are applied across the board. People with chaotic, non-middle class lives have a hard time producing the information they need. Legislators find it hard to understand that there are lots of people out there who don't know where they were born, who their father is or their mother's maiden name. Here in PA we can usually grind through the system to get what is needed, but it does cost money (not hundreds like in this story), a mailing address, and personal appearances. If you are a resident alien and lose your papers, forget about it.

My advice to anybody? Have a up-to-date government picture ID. Even if it means missing a few meals. Sad but true. Oh, and keep expired state IDs if you don't have a passport locked up at home. When I had my purse stolen with everything in it, the only thing that saved me was my old drivers licenses that I kept for no good reason.

[tblue37]

79. Because all these voter ID laws popped up as soon as the USSC gutted the Voting Rights Act

that had been preventing racist state governments from deliberately throwing up obstacles that disproportionately target minority voters. Furthermore, this is clearly a barely disguised poll tax, which was long ago declared unconstitutional and which was a method used in the South specifically to disenfranchise black voters. This man's experience proves that this ID law has prevented a black citizen from voting and shows it will deprive (and undoubtedly already has deprived) other minority citizens of this essential right, and therefore is evidence that the USSC was absolutely wrong to strike down essential parts of the Voting Rights Act.

[oberliner]

92. That is true

However, the problems described in the article would impact low income voters of any race, would they not?

[nadinbrzezinski]

82. LMAO

thanks for the laugh. This is absolutely about race.

[oberliner]

93. Nothing in the article suggests it is about race

Do you not think a low income white person could have had the identical experience?

[nadinbrzezinski]

100. If you do not know what is the intent of these laws

I can't help you

[oberliner]

102. I understand the intent of the laws is to disenfranchise minority voters

I am just saying that this particular article is about one person's awful experience dealing with getting the necessary paperwork, and paying insanely high fees, in order to be able to vote - and then not being able to do so. The situation is outrageous and one that impacts this person for reasons unrelated to his race.

[nadinbrzezinski]

103. It was particular persons that drove the civil rights impetus to

Hit the streets. Go rent Selma and watch it. The beginning highlights that

[oberliner]

104. Go rent Selma?

Putting aside the fact that you are suggesting renting a fictional Hollywood movie as some sort of source for information, allow me to suggest that you are missing my point here. I recognize that Wisconsin's restrictive voter laws particularly impact minority voters (and were implemented, in part of that reason); they also impact low income voters of all races, which is what this article illustrates by enumerating the various fees involved in getting the documents necessary to vote.

[LanternWaste]

94. How is his gender relevant?

How is his gender relevant? The headline refers to him being a man but that does not seem pertinent to the article.

Odd that the things we either focus on at the expense of ignoring a parallel concern often illustrates who we are much more accurately than we may be comfortable with...

[oberliner]

96. I was thinking that too

Why not just say "person" or use the actual name in the headline?

I don' t think there is anything odd about noticing that the problems described in the article could impact low income people of any race (or gender for that matter).

[Bradical79]

119. I don't see why you think it's less relevant

than any other personal detail about him given. Maybe the article should have explicitly stated how minorities are targeted by these laws, thus making the detail more acceptable to some people.

[oberliner]

121. It is the only personal detail about him identified in the headline

Certainly, mentioning his race along with other personal details in the body of the article makes perfect sense. I am just not understanding why it was included in the headline. If the article had devoted a paragraph or two to discussing how minorities are targeted by these laws, then the headline would have made sense. There were no such paragraphs included in the article, though. The focus of the piece seems to be related more to the inconveniences and obscene fees necessary for many people who need to acquire the necessary documentation to be able to vote.

[LiberalFighter]

14. This needs to be documented for the courts.

And there needs to be better attorneys that know what the hell they are doing when they challenge it in court.

[Ilsa]

15. This is OBSCENE!

No one should have to spend a dime to get an unexpedited records documentation. This is all dedigned to disenfranchise people, especially the poor.

Walker should burn in hell over this.

[Scuba]

18. In defense of Wanker's voter supression law, the guy is black. And we all know ...

... who blacks vote for, eh?














.


sarcasm thingy here for those w/o the gene

[Praek3]

19. Criminal Walker is to Blame

Wanker's whole political life has been spent attempting to deny rights, services, and opportunities to anyone whom he perceives as a threat, i.e. anyone not myopic and totalitarian like himself.

The needs, wants, and earned opportunities desired by the majority of Wisconsin's citizens are ignored by Wanker & Cronies. The divide and conquer method employed by the GOP/TEA monopoly is directly responsible for the worsening conditions in our formerly robust state. His attack on our voting rights is just one more example of this.

Wisconsin and her people are being openly and systemactically destroyed by Scott Walker and his legislative lemmings.

[onecaliberal]

24. WTF

[kristopher]

25. K&R

[FighttheFuture]

28. Should've bought his whiteface Halloween mask/makeup!

[Jackilope]

37. Grrrrrrrrrrr! Outrageous!

In Walker's Wisconsin, not surprised. So angry what all this poor man was put through to vote.

[SammyWinstonJack]

39. Criminal.

[zstat]

41. If 1 in 10,000 voters is not eligible, how many of the 9,999 do we stop with "restrictive" laws

Lets reframe this situation. How many eligible individuals "should" be prevented from voting because we want to prevent one ineligible voter, that is, to prevent one voter fraud occurrence? In other words, how restrictive should the law be that is passed by congress to prevent a fraud by one person who is not eligible to vote? How many people who are actually eligible do we prevent from voting in order to stop one fraudulent voter? This is truly a reasonable question.

Lets suppose there is one potential fraud for every 10,000 voters in a city like Springfield.
Should the ratio be: prevent 10 people out of 10,000 from voting by passing minimal restrictions so that one actual fraud is prevented and 9,990 actually vote are not restricted; or prevent a 100 people from voting by passing more restrictive rules so that 9,900 actually vote and 100 are not able to vote and one actual fraud is prevented; or prevent 1,000 people from voting by passing extremely restrictive rules so that 9,000 actually vote and one fraud is prevented.

Clearly you are morel likely to prevent the one voter fraud person if you put in restrictions to prevent 1000 of 10,000 people from voting than if you put in restrictions to prevent 10 of 10,000 people from voting. What is the limit? Should we prevent 2,000 from voting in order to "catch" that one person attempting to cast a fraudulent vote

So, how do you decide on passing restrictive voting eligibility rules? Who decides? What is the cost versus the benefit? How many voters are wrongfully prevented from voting in order to pass restrictive voting eligibility rules theoretically intended to stop that one bad ineligible voter?

Lets switch the logic completely. What if we decided that falsely preventing an eligible person to vote is as harmful in our democracy as falsely enabling an ineligible person to vote. If there is 1 in 10,000 persons who show up at the voting place that is not eligible, how many of the 9,999 do we prevent from voting?

The recent changes in voter registration indicates that some states think it is OK to prevent several hundred people from voting in order to prevent that 1 in 10,000 fraudulent vote.

Preventing hundreds if not thousands from voting when the occurrence of voter fraud is "uncommon" if not rare sounds absurd!!!!! Well it is absurd.

Lets consider drugs. There is no drug that would remain on the market today if prior trials showed that for every 10,000 prescriptions of that drug, there can be no more than 1 negative side effect. The house of representatives would pass a law that says, If the drug has more than 1 per 10,000 serious side effects, it can not be introduced into the community.

Reframing the "issue" warrants a different logic.

[BillZBubb]

42. Hey what's the complaint? The law worked exactly as planned.

Just in case:

[Todays_Illusion]

43. The most embarassing factor in the voter ID laws is that the DNC is not doing anything to counter it

. nt

[voteearlyvoteoften]

44. Kick

[allan01]

45. sue the sops

this felgercarbe is pulled in 3d world countries by us . time the sue the b##$%^&*s() bastards and i want to see the scentence make it hurt .
and one more thing

[KamaAina]

46. Vaccination records?!

edit: And that was in Illinois, which hasn't been under Rauner's thumb long enough to start pulling this kind of crap. Or so I thought.

[3catwoman3]

69. Truly bizarre.

And complete bullshit.

[maxrandb]

47. Add this as one more thing I'm pi$$ed about

[gratuitous]

48. Seems about right

Let's put in these kinds of security measures for all our constitutional rights. Just to make sure they're not abused, or anyone perpetrates a fraud. National security, and all that. Institute these safeguards on everyone wishing to purchase a firearm (just to name one right totally at random), and let's see how long these voter ID laws would stand.

[Igel]

49. Attribution error.

A while back I had to help my mother do something. My father had suddenly and unexpectedly died and there were legal niceties to take care of.

Her ID was a disaster. Let's assume her birth name was Kelly Jane Legi, and she married Mr. Igel, my father, and that's how it stood on her birth certificate (which, by some miracle, she had--she had no idea where she was born, her mind was already faltering a bit).

Her driver's license read Kelly L. Igel. "L." stood for "Legi."

Her SS card said Kelli Jane Igel. Her employer, when it applied for the SS# back in the late '40s or early '50s, misspelled her name.

Her bank accounts said Kelli Legi Igel. She wanted to re-affirm her original surname.

Her will said Kelly Legy Igel. She wanted to re-affirm her grandparents' original surname, before it was misspelled by some clerk.

And we won't even deal with bank accounts opened, somehow, under an alias, where Kelli (or Kelly) Legi (or Legy) managed to make its way onto the official documentation.

She relied on good will of banks, the DMV, lawyers, etc., in negotiating her way through life with all of these different variant names. She always managed to either get leniency or just let them dictate what alias she had to use. Until she hit the SS, where she had to deal with her husband's benefits and estate, and her SS records and birth certificate were fundamentally at odds with everything else. We took hours at the SSA fixing that problem.

Then it was one thing at a time, as the DMV, bank accounts, laywers all corrected their documentation and rolled back the sea of aliases my mother had surrounded herself with, some of them on accounts or documentation going back to the '60s and '70s. This was 2010. "Sorry, my mother's used an unacknowledged alias for her driver's license for the last 55 years. Oops." "Yes, Major Bank, that 35-year-old account has had the wrong name attached to it. Nobody with that legal name has ever existed to our knowledge."

Then there was the IRS, where no taxes were owed, but we had to tell them that my mother had, for 60 years, used numerous aliases for various purposes, nearly at random, all without bothering to cross-reference them.

It was no laughing matter that her marriage license was issued to one of the aliases. When I did the books for a small non-profit we went through all the IRS/SSA reconciliation nonsense, and one of our employees had a similar problem. Was he "Joshua Duke, Jr" or "Joshua Duke" or "Joshua Matthew Duke"? Joshua Matthew Duke, with the SS card, had paid no FICA since he was 20. "Joshua Duke, Jr" and "Joshua Duke" had paid FICA but had paid FICA for Joshua Duke, Jr, who had never registered with the SS Administration. It took him a while to clear up, and it was easier to do when he was 50 than it would have been when he was applying for benefits.

Moral: If this guy hadn't straightened this up now, he'd have had to deal with it later.

[stopbush]

50. Not only did Walker's insidious law have its intended effect of denying a person their right to vote

it had the added effect of costing an unemployed person money that they could ill afford to spend in a futile effort to follow the insidious law.

Wow - there's a big ol' BONUS that must make Scottie Walker feel very proud of himself.

Sick fuck.

[randr]

51. Is there any oversight in predominately white/christan precincts?

Is everyone put through the same drill?
Are there poll watchers present to make sure the system is used fairly?

[Mudcat]

52. Sounds like stories from the USSR, not USA

As a veteran, I'm appalled to see this kind of thing happen.

[highprincipleswork]

55. This is shameful, & my heart goes out to Eddie Lee Holloway & others.BTW check your NY registration!

[Gman]

56. If the facts are as stated here

It will be a great case.

[milestogo]

57. The bill was designed to prevent Voting While Black

or Voting while a member of any group prone to Voting While Democratic.

I live in Wisconsin, and there was a year (2001) when I desperately needed food stamps. I needed several forms of identification besides a drivers license, and I couldn't have them without going to another state to get a birth certificate. I had a legitimate WI drivers license (which you couldn't get without other forms of ID) and that wasn't good enough to prove I was who I said I was.

Its become simpler since then, but I'll never forget the frustration I felt with the needless bureaucracy of the "Safety Net". There have to be many more people in need who are hurt by this than there are people committing fraud. The same goes for voting.

[babylonsister]

58. Wow, that's a lot of red tape.

I don't think it's that bad in other states, voting here in FL wasn't.

I just remembered this: I did have to go to the DMV in GA 3 times before I had the paperwork that was required to change a drivers license from TX to GA. Frustrating, now that I think about it. Extremely.

[RoccoRyg]

83. New system

I'm a DHS caseworker here in Illinois. Nowadays, we use a brand new computer system that interfaces with the Social Security Administration and other agencies to verify your identity. We no longer need birth certificates, just one ID, proof of income and residency if you're a non-citizen (plus assets if you're elderly or disabled). I don't know if Wisconsin has something similar, but I really hope this catches on so problems like that don't happen.

[47of74]

59. Yeah a few days ago the people in SW Wisconsin...

...were bitching about having to show ID to a guy who knew them. The same people who were probably all about the law when it kept "them" from voting. Fuck them. They made their fucking bed now they need to lie in the goddamn thing.

[Amimnoch]

62. I hope some group takes this up as a case to challenge the

Constitutionality of the law.

I'd also like to see a civil suit for disenfranchisement damages.. Set a whole new court precedent.

Downright infuriating disenfranchisement.

[Jopin Klobe]

63. Dear, sweet Mother of God ...

... this needs to stop ...

... NOW ...

... they are ripping this country apart ...

[lordsummerisle]

67. Outrageous k&r n/t

[Elmer S. E. Dump]

71. no words can describe how I feel n/t

[ScreamingMeemie]

73. UGH. Just really... UGH

[tblue37]

78. Just another poll tax--something that was long since declared *unconstitutional*! nt

[nadinbrzezinski]

81. The governor is correct

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker said his state’s strict new voter-ID requirement worked “just fine” in the April 5 primary,

It worked just as intended.

[Enthusiast]

84. It's a wonder he wasn't deported.

I suspect we have seen nothing yet. The cheating and disenfranchisement will reach epic proportions during the NY primary.

[peace13]

98. The beauty of these laws is that the qualifications are a moving target.

You get one paper and they need something else. My sister became disabled and moved back to Ohio so that I could help her. She needed an ID to vote and to travel by air. Her Idaho drivers license was still valid although she was confined to a wheelchair and could barely lift her head let alone a hand. We gathered all of the required information for the ID and went to the DMV. Oops, her name was in the Ohio system from when she was a teenager. Her maiden name was attached to her social security number. A new Ohio law required her to present divorce papers and marriage certificate to prove how her name had changed. My sister had been married three times so even if we had a copy of the last marriage certificate we still would not prove her maiden name. I asked the clerk to write down for me what she needed in order to process the ID because it was going to take a lot of leg work to get three marriage certificates from three different states and copies of the two additional divorce papers if that is what they were asking for. The clerk told us that she would not write it down for me because when we came back the law could have changed by then. OMG we were so frustrated. We had been in the office for over an hour with the wait and we're going home empty handed. At one point my other sister whispered to us that Lisa might have to marry our cousin Billy to get her maiden name back! We cracked up. Out of the peanut gallery of people waiting at the DMV came a middle aged man. He said, 'I don't know what kind of problem you ladies are having but I want to tell you that you have the best sense oh humor I have ever seen." That made our day. In the end we had to lave the building without an ID.

The next day I called a DMV branch where the clerk knew me from volunteering at the school. I asked her what she needed to make the ID happen. I took the one set of divorce papers in plus addition requested information, none of which showed maiden name. After an hour in the office and several calls to a State attorney we finally got the ID. While we were working this out a man from the peanut gallery came up and said he was in a hurry and couldn't wait any longer. The clerk told him to sit down and wait, that the person she was helping had a problem and that she was certain he would rather have his problem than hers.

My point in this story is that without an advocate things don't happen. The man in the story above, he had a moving target too. It takes, time, money and most often an advocate to work the system. People with empathy can see how these awful laws silence the voices of many. The rest will have to try and work through the system on their own to understand how stacked it is against the little guy. My heart goes out to the man in the article. It is a demeaning process.

[gregcrawford]

101. The only good Republican...

... (complete the sentence as you see fit)

[Gothmog]

108. Voter ID laws are solely for voter suppression

[packman]

110. My anger meter went off the charts - unbelievable

Where's the DOJ, ACLU? Fucking Repukes taking away a basic American right. Remember , way back when, the Republican party that stood for Americanism - now it just stands for preserving itself, fuck America.

I pray someone takes this man's plight right to the courts.

[BainsBane]

113. This is precisely the purpose of that and similar laws

[thereismore]

117. Bernie: If you're 18 you can vote. Boom. How hard is that. nt

[Bad Dog]

118. I don't need any id to vote.

I usually take the registration card they put through the letter box about 4 weeks before, but I don't need to. Nobody does over here (UK). And electoral fraud is not a problem.

[underthematrix]

120. HRC's campaign and DNC are addressing this in court.

This is the appropriate way for a presidential candidate to address this very very serious problem.