In recent years, Republicans at the state and federal level have worked diligently to win elections by blocking likely Democrats from voting. The key has been state efforts to pass voter-ID laws, under the auspices of preventing voter fraud. Of course, proponents push these schemes without any evidence of actual fraud.
Historically, the Justice Department would block these disenfranchisement efforts, but the Bush gang, with its “unique” perspective on civil rights, overrode career attorneys and approved measures that made it harder for minorities to participate in elections.
The reality-based community has been insisting for years that low-income voters, disproportionately Democrats, are being blocked from the voting booths by laws that mandate voter IDs. Now there’s additional evidence to suggest the Dems have been right all along.
Poor, black and elderly people tend to be less likely than others to have the photo identification required to vote under Indiana law, opponents of the law said Tuesday, citing a survey of prospective voters.
Democrats, too, are less likely to have the right ID, said the foes who filed a legal brief Tuesday in an effort to persuade the Supreme Court the law is unfair and should be overturned. The court will hear arguments in the case early next year, in the middle of the 2008 election campaign.
The state has defended the law as a way to combat voter fraud. Opponents say it unfairly targets poor and minority voters, without any evidence that voter cheating is a problem in Indiana.
“The alleged ill that this is out to correct doesn’t really exist,” said Justin Levitt, counsel for the Brennan Center for Justice at the NYU School of Law, which filed a brief arguing against the law. “There’s no real justification for putting these people through this.”
Well, no, of course not. That is, unless you’re a Republican official who’s afraid of a fair fight, and feels the need to tip the electoral scales before voters even head to the polls.
As Josh Marshall put it, “Remember, the point of voter ID laws is not to eliminate fraud it is to eliminate Democratic voters.”
[I]f your voter ID law disenfranchises 10% of voters and 80% of those are Democrats you’ve just handed yourself several percentage points that can win you a bunch of close elections — it’s certainly easier than winning them the old fashioned way.
Here’s some of the results of the study in Indiana:
* 21.8% of black Indiana voters do not have access to a valid photo ID (compared to 15.8% of white Indiana voters – a 6 point gap).
* When non-registered eligible voter responses are included – the gap widens. 28.3% of eligible black voters in the State of Indiana to not have valid photo ID (compared to 16.8% of eligible voting age white Indiana residents – a gap of 11.5 percent).
* The study found what it termed “a curvilinear pattern (similar to an upside down U-curve)” in the relationship between age and access to valid ID – younger voters and older voters were both less likely to have valid ID compared to voters in the middle categories. 22% of voters 18-34 did not have ID, nor did 19.4% over the age of 70. (compared to 16.2% of Indiana voters age 35-54 without valid ID and 14.1% for 55-69 year olds).* 21% of Indiana registered voters with only a high school diploma did not have valid ID (compared to 11.5% of Indiana voters who have completed college – a gap of 9.5%).
* Those with valid ID are much more likely to be Republicans than those who do not have valid ID. Among registered voters with proper ID, 41.6% are registered Republicans, 32.5% are Democrats.
Kevin Drum, whose post on this has some very helpful charts, adds, “[T]his is probably just a coincidence. I’m sure Karl Rove and the RNC had no idea that the demographics broke down like this. Right?”
Of course not. If they did, these voter-ID schemes would be a blatant example of racist disenfranchisement and a widespread, illegal scam to tilt the electoral playing field in the Republicans’ favor.
And surely these men of high character would never do such a thing.