Racially Targeted Voter ID Bills Pass Committee

According to Gardner Selsby at the Statesman, HB218 and HB626 have passed the House Elections Committee at the Texas House of Representatives.

King’s proposal, approved by 4-3, would require a voter to provide proof of US citizenship when registering to vote and would require the official voter registration application to be in the form of business reply mail (in an envelope), instead of a reply postcard.

Brown’s proposal, also clearing the committee by 4-3, would set a new hurdle before voters cast ballots. They’d be required to present qualifying identification, such as a driver’s license or other state-issued photo ID, in addition to a voter’s registration certificate.

According to the post, Houston State Senator Rodney Ellis has said he has commitments from Senate Democrats to stop the bill.

I'm waiting for the explanation of how the business reply mail requirement to register to vote would affect Deputy Voter Registrars and their ability to register voters in person; or would DVRs be required to demand a birth certificate during registration efforts.

Brown's proposal is one that is interesting. One must ask if it would force all voters to present an ID and just how the state expects to enforce this law. There is no doubt that King's and Brown's intent is to effectively decrease voter participation, particularly in ethnic and lower socioeconomic communities.

It's time for people to wake up and begin our lobbying efforts on these targeted bills.

Update: I received a comment stating that those of us taking the anti-Voter ID side are "offending minorities" by basically "supporting voter fraud." What the commenter is doing is making the assumption that minority communities are committing voter fraud, much like Republicans in the Texas Legislature. And that is why this bill is so targeted. There was more White-on-Ethnic-American voter fraud in 2000 and 2004 that Republicans will not face up to, yet, feel the need to make Ethnic-Texans use a voter ID. Basically, they want to legalize keeping people of color out of the polling locations.

The commenter also stated that the state would pay for IDs for the poor. This is the Republican methodology for figuring the number of voters us committed Deputy Voter Registrars would be allowed to target:

The revenue loss is determined by applying the percentage of the population below poverty level (16.2%) to the estimated number of persons that would register to vote (72,864), the estimated number of persons eligible to execute the affidavit that they are financially unable to pay the fee for an identification card would be 11,804 (72,864 X 16.2% = 11,804). If the fee were waived for these persons, the estimated revenue loss for the Texas Mobility Fund would be $177,060 for each fiscal year (11,804 x $15 = $177,060).

So, we'd be allowed less than 12,000 new voters each year that are poor based on their estimates. The very fact that we're playing with numbers like this is offensive. Anyone who is eligible should be able to register. THEN, should be allowed to vote solely with a certificate OR an ID, since they have to prove they are eligible to vote just to register. To force voters to use both, when I'm pretty sure a survey would find that most voters do no use the certificate most of the time, is a threat to democracy. They are simply putting up roadblocks based on their notions that Ethnic communities are committing voter fraud.