by Ray Mueller published 2/13/2020
Are there subtle ways to win an election before the ballots are counted? That seems to be a foolish question but it’s relevant as voting starts in what portends to be a pivotal political year.
That’s because voter suppression persists in various ways throughout the country. Multiple tactics are used to dissuade some people from voting.
One tactic is to close polling places – nearly 1,700 in 13 states since 2012, including 750 in Texas, 320 in Arizona, and 214 in Georgia. This creates backups at the remaining polling places, prompting some people to leave without voting.
Georgia’s Lumpkin County (284 square miles and a population of 33,000) has one polling place. Imagine funneling all Calumet County voters outside of Appleton to Chilton, New Holstein, Brillion, or Sherwood.
Disabled people find access impossible or difficult at some sites. A Wisconsin report for 2015 found 4,000 accessibility problems at 808 sites – 1,650 of them serious enough to prevent a handicapped person from voting.
A recent Wisconsin news story, headlined “Model voting rights program in decline,” detailed how monitoring of accessibility problems has withered in recent years due to lack of funding and staffing. Yes, handicapped persons should consider asking for and voting by absentee ballot.
Some states have a lifetime ban on voting by anyone who has been incarcerated (millions combined in Alabama, Florida, Kentucky and Mississippi alone). A 2018 Florida referendum vote backed restoring voting rights to those who have completed their sentence. Republicans in Florida’s legislature hope to nullify the voters’ will.
An Ozaukee County judge’s ruling would purge about 232,500 people from Wisconsin’s voter rolls because some of them have moved. Most have moved but thousands of others would be improperly purged. Other states purge massively because of slight spelling discrepancies in names. Multiple same names in a voting district also prompt purging.
Republicans, including those in Wisconsin, are obsessed with “voter fraud” (Republican zealots wish certain people won’t vote). Fraud is a person voting multiple times or ineligible persons casting a ballot. There is some “voter fraud” but proven violations are few in any voting cycle.
In some communities, political partisans try to suppress voting by presumed opponents. They distribute fliers or post notices with incorrect voting dates or places or claim that anyone with a pending legal charge can’t vote. Isn’t that fraud too? Some states require registration up to 30 days before the election, inconveniencing anyone who moves during that time from voting.
Wisconsin allows same day registration with a proven 10-day residence and other identification. Wisconsin has about 1.1 million voting age residents (about 8,000 in Calumet County) who haven’t even registered to vote.
For more on voter suppression, read “Election Bias” (page 67) in the January 2020 Harper’s magazine online or at your local library.
Who’s going to police election laws in 2020? It won’t be the Federal Election Commission, which lacks a quorum because the Trump administration won’t appoint new members. Any wonder why?