UCSD research: Voter ID laws depress Democratic turnout by an average 8.8 percent, R t/o by 3.6 pct

[ProgressiveEconomist]

While serving with Jimmy Carter on a Baker-Carter Commission set up to recommend electoral reform after the Y2K disaster, evil genius Jim Baker apparently snookered Carter. Carter agreed to allow states to impose voter ID requirements on voters. Remember, one of JC's proudest accomplishments was Motor Voter, allowing voter registration at DMV offices as well as at the SoS election bureau.

At the time a law professor from Geo Washington U wrote a scathing dissent, warning that obviously those less likely to own a car would be less likely to have their votes counted.

Now a brilliant study from UCSD, a hotbed of economic experts on voter turnout, has convinced many that the GWU prof's warning was fully justified. See http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/2016/feb/10/voter-id-paper/ for a local SD newspaper's summary of the study.

Here's a snippet:
The study focused on the 11 states with the strictest voter ID laws, generally requiring photo identification to cast a ballot. Researchers used a large voter survey database to compare turnout in those states to those in states with lesser or no ID requirements.Several states have passed less strict ID laws. But in 17 states including California, New York and Illinois, a more traditional honor system still applies at the ballot box

[FrodosPet]

1. Being without identification screws up people in a lot of ways

Without an ID it is impossible to function in our society. No legitimate jobs, no banking, you cannot even get a drink of booze if you look too young or you go to one of those "ID Everyone" bars or stores.

Much more has to be done to help even the poorest and most isolated people get personal photo identification.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

2. Homogeneusly Caucasian ND

has no voter registration at all. There are several good histories of voting, showing how needless bureaucratic barriers were used for mass disfranchisement of ex-slaves during Reconstruction, of immigrants during the early 20th century and of the poor for hundreds of years.

[Gothmog]

3. Ari Berman has some good comments on this study

Ari Berman points out that this study confirms the results of other studies http://www.mediaite.com/online/study-shows-that-republican-backed-voter-id-laws-are-really-working-for-them/

Ari Berman, author of Give Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Voting Rights in America, told Mediaite that the results of the new study, while “certainly dramatic,” recalled other studies that have shown voter ID laws are successful at dissuading certain demographics from voting. Specifically, he noted a 2014 study by the Government Accountability Office, which found that voter ID laws in Kansas and Tennessee reduced turnout by 2 to 3 percent, particularly among young, black, and newly registered voters.

“I believe that is why Republicans are so aggressively pushing these laws,” Berman said. “To reduce turnout among Democratic-leaning voters, especially considering there is scant evidence of voter impersonation fraud to justify them.”

[ProgressiveEconomist]

4. Thanks for that link

I wonder how quickly a new challenge based in part on some of this research could get to a new USSC for reversal of their ratification of Voter ID.

[L. Coyote]

5. A new Supreme Court might throw these restrictions out, so expect Rs to fight that too.

A lot is at stake with Supreme Court nomination right now, a pivotal point in political history that reverses the majority of the court, likely for decades to come.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

7. What really scares me is Ruth

Bader Ginsberg's advanced age. Remember when cameras caught her sleeping through last year's SOTU?

If Rs stonewall President Obama's USSC nom, and then win the WH, Rs may get to replace both Scalia and Ginsberg,putting them up 1, not down one.

[UTUSN]

6. k & r

Last edited Mon Feb 15, 2016, 11:24 PM - Edit history (1)