Voting Rights

Governor Brian Kemp today signed into law HB 392, which has a provision requiring Georgia’s secretary of state to take steps to shore up the security of the state’s voter registration database. The move comes just weeks after Gov. Kemp signed HB 316, which included new protections for Georgia voters who are required to cast provisional ballots. These bills were passed in direct response to a lawsuit brought on behalf of Common Cause Georgia by the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, along with Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton, & Garrison LLP, and Sugarman LLP.

Today, Fair Elections Center and Pines Bach LLP filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin, on behalf of Common Cause in Wisconsin and individual plaintiff Ben Quintero, challenging Wisconsin’s unnecessary requirements for student IDs to qualify as voter ID.

Liza McClenaghan of government watchdog group Common Cause Florida said lawmakers should mandate what are called risk-limiting audits prior to the certification of election results. “This gives more confidence to the election process as observed by the voters,” McClenaghan said.

The partisan intent of the citizenship question is clear and Commerce v. New York presents a new opportunity for the Supreme Court, with newly appointed Justice Brett Kavanaugh, to show that it is above partisanship. This case, coupled this term with Rucho v. Common Cause and Lamone v. Benisek, the challenges to North Carolina’s and Maryland’s outrageous partisan gerrymanders, will give the court ample opportunity to show that it truly not a partisan branch of government.

David Vance, the National Media Strategist at government watchdog organization Common Cause, told Newsweek that the Husted decision had enabled state legislatures to use purges of rolls to suppress voters. "In greenlighting Ohio’s voter roll purges, the Husted ruling has inspired a variety of methods to remove voters from the polls for partisan gain," he said. "The Arizona bill is just the latest example of voter suppression tactics stemming from the Husted decision. It appears to be nothing more than another attempt by politicians to dictate who will vote and who won’t for their own advantage. We should be looking for ways to get more Americans to vote, not making it more difficult for those that do vote to cast their ballots."

The “For the People Act” offers common sense solutions to problems Americans are demanding that their elected officials solve. These pro-democracy reforms are tested and proven to be effective on the state and local level where citizens, tired of waiting for Washington to act, worked to enact these reforms. Citizen action has moved elected officials in many states and municipalities and citizens have also taken matters into their own hands and passed ballot initiatives. As we outlined in our Democracy on the Ballot report, more than 90% of the pro-democracy reform initiatives passed in each of the last two cycles.