Republicans say SB 2 will make it harder for voters to cheat.
Democrats like state Rep. Charles Booker (D-Louisville) say GOP lawmakers passed the voter photo ID bill to make it easier for their party to win in November. “The fact that SB 2 is being rushed into law with clear aims of impacting the 2020 election is even more abhorrent,” said Booker, who wants Sen. Mitch McConnell’s job.
So do fellow Democrats Mike Broihier and Amy McGrath. They’re the three main contenders in their party’s senatorial primary. Both the Democratic and Republican primaries have been postponed from May 19 to June 23.
“Republicans know that Mitch McConnell is vulnerable, and they’re willing to disenfranchise Kentuckians to save his seat,” said Broihier, a Lincoln County farmer, educator, former small-town newspaper editor, and retired Marine officer.
McGrath, from Georgetown, said legislators “should be making voting easier for Kentuckians, not harder.” The former Marine officer and fighter pilot brought up the coronavirus epidemic. “How are people supposed to get a photo ID when everything is shut down?” she asked.
Brohier agreed. “Once again, Republicans are proving their lack of respect for the interests and safety of voters.”
While SB 2 requires an eligible voter to show government-issued photo identification to cast a ballot, heretofore, voters only needed personal ID, or they could vote if a poll worker recognized them.
The GOP says SB 2 is needed to fight in-person voter fraud. Democrats say there’s zero evidence of impostors voting. The bill’s sponsors are Republicans. SB 2 passed the GOP-majority House and Senate on a near straight party line vote.
“SB 2 is a shameful and absolutely unnecessary bill that creates a solution in search of a problem,” Booker said. “We know there are essentially no cases of voter fraud.”
Broihier and McGrath agree.
“In the midst of a public health crisis, when gatherings pose a risk to the public, other states in the union are moving towards voting by mail to ensure that democracy can function – despite the circumstances of the coronavirus outbreak,” Broihier said. “That’s not happening here in Kentucky. This voter ID law is a cowardly attempt by the Kentucky GOP to further limit access to the ballot box, at a time when we should be expanding that access.”
Added Booker: “We know the history behind bills like this. Poll taxes, literacy tests, felony disenfranchisement, all stem from a shameful past that once forced my own grandfather to guess the number of beans in a jar before he could vote.
“This bill will make it harder for many Kentuckians to vote, especially the most vulnerable among us. When I spoke against this bill on the House floor, it was out of a commitment to uplift the voices of Kentuckians. We must break down barriers to the ballot box, not build them up. This is exactly why I have sponsored bills to fully restore voting rights and expand access.”
McGrath said the General Assembly “should change the law to allow people to vote by mail during this time, in the interest of public health, not pass laws designed to keep people from exercising their right to vote.”
The bill is on Gov. Andy Beshear’s desk. He has said he opposes any legislation that makes it harder for people to vote. Even if he vetoes the measure, the Republicans can override him with a simple majority in both chambers. The GOP holds a 29-9 edge in the Senate a 61-37 bulge in the House where there are two vacancies.
Booker pledged to “continue fighting this type of suppression as a state representative, and will lead the charge to ensure all Kentuckians can be heard as our next U.S. Senator.”
Other critics of the bill include the ACLU of Kentucky, Louisville Courier Journal columnist Joe Gerth, Lexington Herald-Leader columnist Linda Blackford, and Murray State University historian Brian Clardy.
“The final version of Senate Bill 2 is missing important provisions that would have softened the blow to voters, especially people of color, senior citizens, the poor, people with disabilities, and people who live in rural areas — some of the very same populations that are the most vulnerable to the current pandemic,” said Corey Shapiro, ACLU-Kentucky legal director.
“Thousands of people who do not meet the newly mandated identification requirements will have to choose between exposing themselves to COVID-19 to obtain identification, or being forced to sit on the sidelines on Election Day. Many Kentuckians will not even have the option to obtain a new ID because county clerk’s offices throughout the Commonwealth have closed following the recommendation of public health officials. It is unconscionable for politicians to move this legislation at a time when Kentuckians are not allowed in the Capitol and are losing their jobs, their small businesses, access to childcare, and more.
“We remain concerned about the rushed timeline and lack of resources to implement the bill just months before a highly anticipated general election. We look forward to seeing what, if any, action Governor Beshear may take on the bill. …”
Gerth wrote that “there is absolutely no evidence that there are scores of people showing up at the polls to vote while claiming they are someone they’re not. It doesn’t happen.”
Republican Secretary of State Michael Adams championed the photo ID bill. “When a Courier-Journal reporter asked … Adams how many people have been prosecuted for doing that over the past decade, he couldn’t give an answer,” Gerth also wrote.
Wrote Blackford, “Let’s start off by saying there are nearly no examples of voter fraud with people using fake IDs in Kentucky or anywhere else. Justin Levitt, a professor at the Loyola Law School, Los Angeles, has been tracking alleged fraud since 2008 and found 31 instances of potential fraud out of 1 billion votes cast. Fraud that Kentucky has experienced in the past, such as vote-buying, would not be stopped with a photo I.D.
“… But let’s be honest about what this bill would do. These kinds of bills, which have popped up all over the country, predominantly target the elderly, the poor, and minorities, who may not have access to the kinds of documents they need to get a photo I.D., or the transportation they need to get to the voting box one day and the county clerk’s office the next.”
Clardy said SB 2 is typical of voter suppression measures Republican-majority legislatures are pushing and passing in other states. He likened them to laws that white supremacist southern Democratic legislatures passed to disfranchise African Americans during the Jim Crow Era.
“But what’s really galling is that the Republicans decided to do this, and go after teachers pensions again, during a global pandemic,” he said. “People are dying and several more will die, but they are working overtime to crush the aspirations of those that want to use their franchise and their God-given right to citizenship.
“What they are doing is despicable and beyond shameful. It’s on another level of evil, and it says a lot about where the spirit of the Republican Party is.”
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