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posted by martyb on Saturday April 28 2018, @08:34AM   Printer-friendly
from the a-"little-hiccup" dept.

The Center for American Progress reports

As residents of Arizona's eighth congressional district cast ballots in a special election to replace former Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) in Congress, roughly 140,000 of them may be unaware they are eligible to vote because they did not receive the ID card the county is required to send them after they register.

According to the Arizona Republic, Maricopa County officials have not sent all voters the cards they can use to cast a ballot under Arizona's voter ID law because of an issue with the company used to print the materials. The paper reports that just 60,000 ID cards have been mailed to people who recently registered or changed their registration, while about 140,000 have not been sent.

[...] Arizona was one of the first states in the country to enact a non-photo voter ID law when a ballot measure was approved by voters[1] in November 2004. Under the law, the state must take steps to ensure that all eligible voters have an acceptable form of ID. According to the secretary of state's office[PDF], "a county recorder must issue a voter ID card to any new registrant or an existing registrant who updates his or her name, address, or political party preference".

But because of an error by the company used to print the ID cards, they have not been mailed out since December.

Although these citizens could provide other forms of ID at the polls, some voters told the Arizona Republic they're concerned that less informed voters may not realize they are registered without the card.

[...] During the presidential primary in March 2016, some Maricopa County voters waited in line for up to five hours to cast a ballot. The chaos led to an investigation by the Department of Justice and numerous lawsuits, including one filed by the Democratic National Committee.

Before the U.S. Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act in 2013, Arizona was required to pre-clear any changes to its voting law with the DOJ.

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  • (Score: 2) by VLM on Sunday April 29 2018, @02:50PM

    by VLM (445) on Sunday April 29 2018, @02:50PM (#673404)

    Got to travel to another city because there is no DMV office nearby? Poll tax!

    As a side issue "many" (most?, almost all?) states have at least one class A RV that travels the rural areas and for free if available can attend special events for mobile DMV processing. I live like 5 miles from an office and have a car etc so like 95+% of the population its irrelevant to me, but supposedly in extreme rural farm counties where the closest DMV might be 50 miles away there is near continuous mobile DMV presence "somewhere at some times" ranging from county fairs to scheduled stops at the volunteer fire dept parking lot every tuesday at 2pm or whatever. If you want you can cry about the nearest office being 75 miles away but if you'll just wait until the county fair or weekly at the volunteer fire dept on tuesday afternoons then it'll be OK.

    Note that as a rhetorical argument nothing short of issuing a warrant to track down everyone without an ID and shooting those who won't accept their ID will solve the problem of taking away the vote from people who insist its possible via infinite effort to express no agency in their lives whatsoever such that they've actively avoided all possible ways to vote. As long as that isn't a capital crime, as it should be, that situation will be used as justification to prevent any sort of voting regulation. Could the unibomber have been forced at gunpoint to register to vote from his hermit cabin, if not, then its restricting voting rights. Can a fleeing felon prison escapee register to vote? no, then that is a voting rights violation. But normal people don't mind.

    So it doesn't matter if its easier or harder to vote, its not possible to create a scenario thats 100% and thats all that matters, so frankly trying to appease is a waste of time.

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