Author
Anti-democratic moves by state lawmakers raise fears for 2024 election
In Wisconsin, Republican lawmakers are threatening to impeach both the state’s election administrator, who is highly regarded nationally, and a state Supreme Court justice despite a ruling by the state’s judicial commission that the justice had done nothing wrong — effectively nullifying a recent statewide election she won, Democrats say. In North Carolina, a bill […]
Not just Ohio: Biased language is the hot new tactic to thwart ballot measures
Abortion-rights supporters filed a lawsuit Monday against what they call “deceptive” ballot language produced by Ohio officials for the state’s closely-watched upcoming referendum on the issue. But it isn’t just the Buckeye State that’s lately seeing fierce battles over the once-obscure topic of ballot language. In recent weeks, officials in Missouri — where another abortion-rights measure is […]
Americans are worried about democracy. You wouldn’t know it from the GOP debate.
There’s a growing feeling, among both experts and ordinary Americans, that our democracy isn’t functioning well — and even that it’s under threat. “American democracy is cracking,” the Washington Post reported August 18. “I’m terrified,” one democracy expert told the paper. “I think we are in bad shape, and I don’t know a way out.” Forty-nine percent […]
Ohio voters are deciding if it’s too easy to pass ballot measures. Other states are watching.
CLEVELAND — Ohioans over the last century have used the state’s ballot initiative process to pass constitutional amendments that raised the minimum wage, integrated the National Guard and removed the phrase “white male” from the constitution’s list of voter eligibility requirements. Now, lawmakers want to make it much tougher for an initiative to be approved. […]
Changes in state election laws have little impact on results, new study finds
In recent years, U.S. politics has been consumed by partisan fights over states’ election policies. But a new study by two political scientists is causing a stir by finding that state legislators’ changes to election laws — both those that tighten election rules in the name of integrity, and those that loosen rules to expand access — […]
Federal health insurance website lags in voter registration assistance, Democrats charge
A group of U.S. Senate Democrats is pressing the Biden administration to make it easier for the millions of Americans who sign up each year for health insurance through a federal website to register to vote. The lawmakers, led by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., wrote in a letter to U.S. Department of Health and Human Services […]
Red and blue state divide grows even wider in 2023’s top voting and election laws
Next year’s elections are still 16 months away. But for voters, perhaps the most important developments took place during the first half of this year — when states drafted and passed the legislation that will shape how those contests are run. “The rules that will govern the 2024 election are being written today,” said Megan […]
A GOP claim that Michigan purposely tried to encourage voter fraud doesn’t fit with facts
Republicans at a recent congressional hearing accused Michigan’s chief election official of deliberately leaving tens of thousands of dead voters on the rolls in order to encourage illegal voting. Even at a time of intense partisan conflict over election policies, it was a strikingly direct charge against a sitting official — and one made not […]
A top GOP lawyer wants to crack down on the college vote. States already are.
A top Republican election lawyer recently caused a stir when she told GOP donors that the party should work to make it harder for college students to vote in key states. But the comments from Cleta Mitchell, who worked closely with then-President Donald Trump to try to overturn the 2020 election, are perhaps less surprising […]
U.S. elections official takes part in secretive GOP conference, sparking backlash
A commissioner of a federal elections agency recently spoke at a secretive conference of conservative voting activists and Republican secretaries of state and congressional staff — a step that election experts call highly improper for an official charged with helping states administer fair and unbiased elections. U.S. Election Assistance Commissioner Donald Palmer, the former chief […]
Federal agencies lag in registering voters despite Biden executive order, advocates say
Within weeks of taking office in 2021, President Joe Biden issued an executive order — hailed by voter advocates as potentially transformative — that for the first time committed the U.S. government to registering new voters at federal agencies. But just over two years later, most of the 10 agencies examined in a recent report had made […]
Red-state elections officials balk at voter registration outreach
A day after taking office in January, Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen withdrew his state from the Electronic Registration Information Center, an interstate data-sharing compact aimed at helping states keep clean voter rolls. Asked about the move a few days later by a conservative radio host, Allen, a Republican, at first talked about privacy concerns, […]