League Urge State Election Officials to Prevent Voting Discrimination and Disruption

The League joined 88 voting and civil rights group in urging state election officials to create plans to prevent voting discrimination in advance of the first presidential election in fifty years without a fully operable Voting Rights Act (VRA). Letters were sent to state elections officials in every state.

_________________ October 24, 2016   Dear Secretary of State:   On behalf of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, a coalition charged by its diverse membership of more than 200 national organizations to promote and protect the civil and human rights of all persons in the United States, and the 87 undersigned organizations, we write to express our grave concern over the first presidential election in 50 years without the full protections of the Voting Rights Act (VRA). We urge you to develop a plan to ensure that no one in your state is disenfranchised in the upcoming election.   As you know, the VRA protected the voting rights of racial and ethnic minorities in several states and local jurisdictions where they had been historically discriminated against in voting. These jurisdictions were covered by Section 5 of the VRA, which required the Department of Justice (DOJ) to approve any changes to voting in specific states and localities. However, in 2013 the U.S. Supreme Court’s devastating decision in Shelby County v. Holder negated the pre-clearance requirement and the DOJ’s authority to send observers to covered jurisdictions. Following Shelby, numerous states have passed voting laws, which several federal courts agree have a disparate impact on people of color and language minorities. In the case of North Carolina, for example, the courts found that the state’s massive bundle of voting restrictions, passed within weeks of the Shelby decision, targeted African Americans “with almost surgical precision.”^[1] Evidence shows that restrictive voter laws also suppress turnout of the elderly,^[2] people with disabilities,^[3] and students.^[4]   And while some courts have taken action to block discriminatory laws in states like North Carolina and Texas, these decisions came only after years of costly litigation during which impacted citizens were blocked from voting in the 2014 elections and this year’s primaries. Meanwhile, there is no way of knowing how many potentially discriminatory voting changes are being made by cities, counties, school boards, water boards and other local jurisdictions that were previously required to be precleared. According to “Democracy Diminished,”^[5] a report by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., “more than 85% of preclearance work previously done under Section 5 was at the local level.”   Since Congress has failed to pass a bill to restore the VRA, which has resulted in DOJ’s lacking authority over voting changes in places that Congress determined in 2006 should continue to have federal oversight, we are extremely concerned that there will be widespread voter discrimination in the upcoming presidential election. This is exacerbated by the fact that there will be no DOJ observers holding jurisdictions accountable. In the 2012 general election, the Department of Justice sent 780 federal observers to 51 jurisdictions in 23 states.^[6] Following the Shelby decision, DOJ has said it will not deploy election observers in 2016. The potentially detrimental effect of the absence of this critical voter protection tool cannot be overstated.^[7]   Given the many recent examples of post-Shelby voting discrimination, we urge you to be vigilant regarding potential voter disenfranchisement in your state this November.   Sincerely,   9to5, National Association of Working Women A. PHILIP RANDOLPH INSTITUTE AFL-CIO African American Ministers In Action (AAMIA) American Association of People with Disabilities American Association of University Women (AAUW) American Civil Liberties Union American Constitution Society for Law and Policy American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees American Federation of Teachers American Jewish Committee (AJC) American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) Anti-Defamation League Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF) Asian Americans Advancing Justice - AAJC Asian and Pacific Islander American Vote (APIAVote) Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law Bend the Arc Jewish Action Black Women's Roundtable Black Youth Vote! Brennan Center for Justice Campaign Legal Center The Center for Popular Democracy Center for Women Policy Studies Democracy Initiative Demos Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund Fair Elections Legal Network Feminist Majority Franciscan Action Network Friends of the Earth - United States Human Rights Campaign Human Rights First IAWRTUSA Institute for Science and Human Values Jewish Council for Public Affairs Jobs With Justice LatinoJustice PRLDEF Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights League of Women Voters of the United States MALDEF MoveOn.org NAACP NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. NAACP-National Voter Fund NALEO Educational Fund National Action Network's Washington Bureau National Asian Pacific American Bar Association National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education (NAFEO) National Association of Social Workers National Center for Transgender Equality National Coalition on Black Civic Participation National Congress of American Indians National Council of Asian Pacific Americans (NCAPA) National Council of Churches National Council of Jewish Women National Education Association National LGBTQ Task Force National Urban League NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice OCA - Asian Pacific American Advocates OWL-The Voice of Women 40+ People For the American Way Foundation People's Action Project Vote Public Citizen Rock the Vote Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Sikh American Legal Defense & Education Fund (SALDEF) Southern Coalition for Social Justice Southern Poverty Law Center U.S. Women and Cuba Collaboration Union for Reform Judaism United Church of Christ, Justice and Witness Ministries United Food and Commercial Workers International Union US Human Rights Network Vote.org The Voter Participation Center VoteRiders Voting Rights Forward The Voting Rights Institute Voto Latino Women's Research & Education Institute World Without Genocide at Mitchell Hamline School of Law Young People For, a program of the People For the American Way Foundation       ________________________________________ [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/inside-the-republican... [2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/getting-a-photo-id-so... f14ca9de2972_story.html [3]  http://www.vox.com/2016/4/1/11346714/voter-id-laws-disabilities [4] http://www.ibtimes.com/wisconsin-voter-id-law-could-hurt-college-student... [5] http://www.naacpldf.org/files/publications/Democracy%20Diminished-State%... [6] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-monitor-polls-23-state... [7] http://democracyjournal.org/arguments/discrimination-will-continue-but-w...