One Person, No Vote

On the surface, voter fraud laws seem harmless and reasonable. Requiring identification, cleaning up voter rolls, and ensuring that representatives match their districts seem like acceptable measures for a healthy democracy. Anderson charges that this is an artificial crisis with the goal of cutting voting access to undesirable citizens.

The reality is that voter fraud investigations by government agencies, universities, or independent organizations only unearth a handful of cases. Most of them are not malicious, like the immigrant registering while still in the citizenship process. The thousands of ballots from vacant lots or illegal citizens that politicians claim are often errors from outdated databases. However, the goal of the crusade is not to unearth corruption: It is to justify restrictive voting laws.

Once it has momentum, an artificial crisis can get one’s own candidates into office and force opposing candidates to make concessions to them. This happened with the National Voter Rights Act, in which the voter roll maintenance language responsible for the purging of millions of citizens is the result of years of GOP delays. In the 2000 presidential election, Senator Christopher “Kit” Bond and Bush attorney Mark “Thor” Hearne used voter fraud to justify on-time poll closings in St. Louis, Missouri, even while people were still in line. Both played a role in amplifying voter fraud rhetoric afterwards: Bond by introducing ID requirements to the Help America Vote Act, and Hearne by creating talking points for conservative media attacking majority Black cities.

However, voter ID laws in southern and swing states go beyond HAVA recommendations by disallowing documents like utility bills and assisted housing IDs but accepting gun licenses. In the 2017 Alabama special election, former felons had to use their mugshots to vote and needed legal experts to show poll workers that they are accepted IDs. States like Texas removed sporadic voters from their polls even though it is “expressly forbidden” under the NVRA (74), and Georgia’s elections office made multiple purges before Brian Kemp’s gubernatorial elections.

Anderson frames Republican responses to these accusations as dismissive and condescending. Some speak of voting as a privilege and that it’s the voters’ fault if they fall off the rolls due to inactivity. Others allege that Democrats want to increase their ranks and accuse them of bussing in or paying people, which ignores that voting should be an individual right not a formality in a political game. People deserve the right to vote whether they can afford transportation or not, and political parties should adjust their principles to meet the times. After all, the Democratic Party did when it morphed from the party of Southern slaveowners to a party that reflected America’s diversity.

Voter fraud activists have a dangerous ally in President Donald Trump, who repeats disproven claims and has no issue with leveraging his power through measures like the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity. Politicians like Kris Kobach, Brian Kemp, and Roy Moore latch onto Trump’s views. It is difficult to fight against this disinformation not only because of its frequency, but also a desire to respect the legitimacy of the presidency and interpret politics in a two-party system as a clash of equally justifiable ideas, no matter how extreme one side becomes. However, Anderson stresses that these accusations have been part of Republican messaging long before Trump.

While national media outlets fixate on Washington, DC, and sweeping conspiracies like the Russia investigation, the true threat to American democracy is the encroachment of voting rights in individual states and the nameless politicians who leverage their office to entrance the party’s dominance.

The clearest example of this attitude is gerrymandering, where the controlling party redraws districts to make elections a “foregone conclusion” (96). Shelby County v. Holder, the Supreme Court ruling that gutted the Voting Rights Act, was based on a local gerrymandering scheme targeting an African American councilman. The advanced mapping technology used in states like Pennsylvania can carve districts with pinpoint accuracy, leaving those areas with little voice in state affairs even if their populations are increasing at a faster rate. While both parties are guilty of these attacks, this tactic is venomous to the user as ideological extremists become the only ones who can threaten an incumbent.

Then, there is the soft power of election offices, where closing or limiting the hours of DMV locations impact the electorate. New or purged voters might have to sacrifice work hours or, in the case of one Texas county, travel hundreds of miles for the nearest full-time location. Local jurisdictions can target undesired demographics, such as Waller County, Texas’s history of discrimination against Prairie View A&M or Dodge City, Kansas moving a district’s sole polling place outside of city limits. Just having police officers at polling sites can intimidate voters of color or recently naturalized citizens.

There are also state politicians who wield their offices for party and personal gain with targeted voter roll purges and polling site closings. Florida’s Republican-controlled governor’s office played a key role in constricting turnout in the 2000 election and restricting the recount. Kris Kobach and Mike Pence utilized heavy-handed regulatory tools like Interstate Crosscheck and promoted voter registration witch hunts to leap to the national stage. Brian Kemp was rewarded for maintaining control of the election office during his own campaign.

These officials dodge criticism by citing budgetary needs or calling it a political matter that the courts can’t interfere with. Cases like Gill v. Whitford and Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections show that the Supreme Court is reticent to address issues like partisan gerrymandering and places a disproportionate burden of proof on civil rights organizations to prove foul play. Regulatory matters rarely make national news, and many voters often know little about down-ticket local and state officials outside of party affiliation. It can also be difficult for those with middle-class lifestyles to recognize how onerous these restrictions are to low-income citizens.

The Alabama 2017 special election, however, is a lesson in how to combat these tactics. A well-funded and locally guided grassroots campaign with extensive person-to-person interaction, voting rights workshops, legal assistance, and rideshare offerings can overwhelm these barriers. This election can also be a warning as well: Despite all of Roy Moore’s failings as a candidate, he only lost by 1%.