California’s Motor Voter Program Fraught with Errors
California’s quest to be the nation’s benchmark for automatic (mandatory) voter registration was dealt a blow thanks to a recent audit highlighting issues with its perpetually plagued motor voter program. The audit, released Friday by the Office of California Governor Gavin Newsom, showed that almost 84,000 duplicate voter registrations were on…
House of Representatives Pushing Haphazard Election Overhauls
Opponents of H.R. 1 were galvanized last week, as proponents of the legislation indicated their intentions to enact individual provisions of the law using a “piecemeal” strategy. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer highlighted this intention Thursday, catching opponents in the Senate off guard. Rather than focus on improving the security…
New Election Proposals in Minnesota’s House Would Abandon Bi-Partisan Tradition
Recent proposals to significantly alter elections in Minnesota have raised concerns from advocates of free and fair elections. Adherents of good governance in Minnesota have addressed that anything but bi-partisan, or non-partisan, fixes to the election laws would bring about a “partisan arms-race”, and thus, honored an unwritten tradition that…
Overview: House Oversight and Reform Hearing “Protecting the Right to Vote: Best and Worst Practices”
Yesterday, the House Oversight and Reform Subcommittee on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties held a hearing titled “Protecting the Right to Vote: Best and Worst Practices”. The Subcommittee featured testimony from four witnesses: Dale Ho of the ACLU, Leigh M. Chapman of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights,…
California has Technical Difficulties With its New “Motor Voter” System
Six weeks before its June 5 primary, California election officials are trying to solve errors to its voter database made by its new mandatory (automatic) voter registration system. According to a recent story in the Los Angeles Times, election officials in California claim that 77,000 voter records were impacted after…
In partisan move, Illinois Senate ignores necessary changes by Gov. Rauner to automatic voter registration
The Daily Northwestern reports that the Illinois Senate voted 38-18 to override the veto of Governor Bruce Rauner to the automatic voter registration bill. Governor Rauner called the legislation as originally drafted “injurious” to the Illinois election system. The veto had included slight changes to the bill to conform to federal law and ensure…
Alaska Passes Form of Mandatory Voter Registration
Yesterday, voters in Alaska approved a ballot measure 65% to 35% that will automatically register Alaskans to vote when they apply for Alaska Permanent Fund distributions: Ballot measure 1 would increase the number of registered voters in the state by automatically registering Alaskans when they apply for their PFDs. ….
Despite concerns, Candidate for Oregon Secretary of State calls for Same Day Registration
Brad Avakian, a candidate for Oregon Secretary of State, called for future same day registration despite substantive concerns from election officials and a determination that the system would not work for Oregon. Currently, the Oregon constitution also prohibits same day registration. Election officials have highlighted the cost and administrative headaches. Earlier this…
Automatic Mandatory Registration Becomes Issue in Indiana Governor’s Race
The Indiana Democratic Candidate for Governor has promised to push for automatic mandatory voter registration. Past legislation has failed in the Indiana legislature.