After the Republican takeover of so many state legislatures and governors’ mansions in 2010, they immediately launched a campaign to make it far more difficult to vote. Using the fake ACORN “scandals” as an excuse, many states have made it far more difficult to register and to vote. Mission accomplished.
The number of black and Hispanic registered voters has fallen sharply since 2008, posing a serious challenge to the Obama campaign in an election that could turn on the participation of minority voters.
In the 2008 election, robust turnout among black and Latino voters is credited with putting Obama over the top in key swing states, including Virginia and New Mexico.
Voter rolls typically shrink in non-presidential election years and registrations among whites fell at roughly the same rate, but this is the first time in nearly four decades that the number of registered Hispanics has dropped significantly.
That figure fell 5 percent across the country, to about 11 million, according to the Census Bureau. But in some politically important swing states, the decline among Hispanics, who are considered critical in the 2012 presidential contest, is much higher: just over 28 percent in New Mexico, for example, and about 10 percent in Florida.
For blacks, whose registration numbers are down 7 percent nationwide, and Hispanics, the large decrease is attributed to the ailing economy, which forced many Americans to move in search of work or because of other financial upheaval.
This is exactly why they’ve passed those laws. In Florida, they’ve made it so difficult to run a voter registration drive that even the venerable League of Women Voters were forced to suspend their voter registration programs there. And it worked. As I’ve written many times, the Republicans have a major demographic problem right now; their solution to that problem, in the short run, is to prevent as many young and minority voters from getting to the polls as possible.
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baal
May 10, 2012 at 1:13 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I’m still offended that the right to vote is not nearly as strongly defended as the right to bear arms (/rawr) or free speech. We’re a democracy with universal suffrage (well kinda)!
Among a long list of disappointments, this tops the list of things I’d like the Democrats to pay more attention to or scream more loudly and more often on. I know it’s a not a sexy topic but the huge impact on every election for a given jurisdiction is huge!!!elventy!1!!1.
cottonnero
May 10, 2012 at 1:47 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I think a middle class person may not see the problem with, for example, requiring a picture ID – If you’ve personally carried a driver licence in your pocket or purse every day of your life since you were sixteen, what’s the big deal? It’s one of those issues where the Republicans have staked out a position that seems, to a low-information voter, to be eminently reasonable. (Like “Teach both sides” may seem reasonable to someone who doesn’t know the history behind the ID/Creationism movement, or how anti-same-sex marriage amendments lead people to believe that their opinion on whether or not Otis and George should be able to marry should have some legal weight.)
Leo
May 10, 2012 at 2:55 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@2 – Yeah, there’s this conservative YouTuber that has a handle of something like HowTheWorldWorks. He had some video where he stated that he could not understand how someone could not have an ID. His big three examples were (1) flying, (2) driving, and (3) buying tobacco and/or liqueur.
Having been raised poor, I could easily laugh at 1 and 3. Poor people can’t afford to fly (that was his dumbest point of them all, too). And the stores and bars in my local town don’t card. I lived near a small town, but I’m certain one could find local communes in even the big cities where this is true as well. (Heck, now that I live in a city, I know of bars that don’t card.) Now, since it was a rural community, many people had drivers licenses, so that was the one thing why we needed photo ID’s. If you live somewhere that has public transportation, then there goes that reason.
sivivolk
May 10, 2012 at 6:44 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
The idea of having to register to vote is still bizarre to me. Here you’re either on the list from last year’s taxes, or you bring ID and a bill or something, or you bring a witness who’s on the list who vouches for your living in the area – that’s often how homeless people vote here. Here being Canada, I suppose I should add.
Chiroptera
May 10, 2012 at 6:50 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
baal, #1: I’m still offended that the right to vote is not nearly as strongly defended as the right to bear arms (/rawr) or free speech.
The right to bear arms is the source of all our other rights. When you are able to wage war against the state, you can force the state to recognize your other rights.
That’s why the NRA and gun owner movements have been so active in protecting our right to privacy and habeas corpus and a secular state.
Oh, wait….
keithharwood00
May 10, 2012 at 9:29 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Here in Oz everyone must register to vote when they turn 18 and everyone who is registered must vote at every election. Big fines for missing either. Makes it bloody hard for party hacks to influence who votes.
captainahags
May 10, 2012 at 9:36 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Not everyone has a driver’s license. In fact, many people I know who are from Long Island or the city don’t really carry any form of legit government ID until they get their license at 20 or 21. I’m sure that people who are not as well off as they are might not ever get or need a driver’s license; when you live in Brooklyn or Queens or Staten Island public transit will still get you just about anywhere you need to go, just not always as fast.
w00dview
May 11, 2012 at 8:37 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
You know, for all their speeches about freedom and how tyranny is awful, Republicans sure seem to hate democracy.
frog
May 11, 2012 at 3:21 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I don’t understand how people fall off the rolls? Are they relocating?
The only time I ever had to re-register was after relocating. And honestly, I suspect if I had said nothing and just kept turning up at my old polls, my name would have still been in the book and I could have kept right on voting there.
What are qualifying photo IDs? Would an employment ID be sufficient? How about if libraries started issuing photo IDs?
Michael Heath
May 11, 2012 at 9:52 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
frog writes:
To illustrate how blatant Republicans have got about this issue, the more successful initiatives disqualify college ID cards, even those from public universities.