States should provide uniform poll worker training before Election Day to ensure Election Day runs smoothly.
Polls workers should receive a uniform wage across the state.
Poll worker recruitment should target public employees and high school and college students.
The formula for a well-run polling place is not complicated. At the heart of it, a sufficient number of properly trained poll workers is necessary to smoothly run an election process.
Ballot design should be simple and straightforward to ensure voters understand for whom and for what they are casting their votes.
Ballots should be written in clear, plain language.
Ballot design should focus on the ABCs: Accuracy, Brevity and Clarity.
It seems almost too basic to have to state that the ballots used for voting must be simple and straightforward. Yet, past experience has shown that ballot confusion is common and can have disastrous consequences.
Overly burdensome photo ID laws add an unnecessary layer of bureaucracy that disenfranchises millions of otherwise eligible voters.
Photo ID requirements place tremendous fiscal burdens on states and localities.
States should look to their constitutions to protect the freedom to vote from onerous ID laws.
Restrictive photo ID laws for voting are a level of unnecessary red tape and bureaucracy that hinder the freedom to vote. Strict laws that require narrow types of government-issued ID go above and beyond normal registration requirements.
Provisional ballots are not counted as regular ballots and should be used in only very limited situations.
Provisional ballots cast solely because an eligible voter voted in the wrong precinct or polling place should be counted as a regular ballot for any office for which the voter was eligible to vote.
Adopting Same Day Registration would substantially decrease the need for provisional ballots because eligible voters can simply re-register if there are registration issues.
The scenario occurs regularly on Election Day: a voter will show up at t
Nearly six million people are denied the right to vote due to felony offenses, even if they have completed their sentences.
One out of every 13 eligible African Americans of voting age has lost their right to vote.
States should not permanently take away the freedom to vote from any citizen. At a bare minimum, the right to vote should be automatically restored once a person is released from incarceration.
Prohibiting citizens from voting defies our democracy’s principle of one person, one vote.
States should ensure eligible voters can be added to state registration databases with fair, effective and uniform standards, and should only remove voters in compliance with the National Voter Registration Act and other applicable laws.
Only election officials should be able to challenge the eligibility of a voter.
When a voter is challenged, the burden of proof should fall on the challenger with a specific and timely adjudication process.
Eligible Americans should not have to overcome burdensome barriers to cast their ballots.
Making our election system function for all of our citizens should be a bedrock commitment of our nation. The current disparities by class and race in voter registration—and thus, voter turnout—undermine an essential tenet of our democracy: of, by and for the people. In order to address the current inefficiencies and inadequacies in our election procedures, we have outlined a robust set of policy recommendations and best practices.
Election administration should not be affected by partisan goals.
Partisan election administration increases the risk of disenfranchisement.
Non-partisan election administration boosts faith and confidence in the electoral process and promotes fair and accurate electoral results.
If anything should be free from politics or partisan fighting, it should be our election administration. Regardless of political ideology, everyone can agree that our elections should be conducted in a non-partisan and transparent manner.
People who challenge ballots at polling places would have to outline their reasons for a challenge in an affidavit, under a bill from state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman.
Under state law, any registered voter can challenge the validity of another person's voting status at the ballot box if there's an issue with their signature or they are suspected to be living out of state. When a challenge is raised, the challenged voter then has to recite an oath declaring they are legally able to cast a ballot before they are allowed to vote. [...]
Same-Day Registration (SDR) allows eligible voters to register to vote and cast their ballots on the same day. SDR offers an easy, practical solution that works to fix many registration errors that can prevent eligible voters from casting their ballot.
When Woody Harrelson's character got hired as a bartender on Cheers, he was so excited, he insisted on working for no more than the minimum wage. "I'd work like a slave," he said, "and, of course, I'd wash your car."
Most bar and restaurant workers would prefer to bring home a little more cash. They may be in luck.
Democrats are planning a yearlong campaign against economic inequality as the midterm elections approach, and President Obama will kick it off in earnest Wednesday when he signs an executive order raising the contracting standards for workers on federal contracts.
In the last year or two, something remarkable has happened in American politics. After decades in which future deficits, mostly caused by health care costs and conservative tax cuts, were invoked by those seeking to slash Social Security benefits for reasons of ideology or pecuniary interest, the national conversation has changed.
Today, President Barack Obama honored his promise from last month’s State of the Union address to raise the minimum wage for some workers indirectly employed by the federal government. In a new executive order, he raised the minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour, effective Jan. 1, 2015. The White House estimates the order will affect hundreds of thousands of workers employed by private companies with government contracts. [...]
If the road to hell is paved with good intentions, perhaps the same could be said about many of today’s 401K plans. Employers craft benefit packages with the best of intentions, yet, there’s a good chance you may be administering or participating in a retirement plan not in compliance with new Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) regulations. Last year nearly 75% of plans audited by the Department of Labor (DOL) were either fined, received penalties or had to make reimbursements fo
Georgia Republicans are pushing a bill that would dramatically shorten early voting for city elections. The effort is the latest to take advantage of the Supreme Court’s ruling last year on the Voting Rights Act (VRA), which made it easier for certain areas to change election rules in ways that hurt racial minorities.
As the White House prepares to launch a major economic opportunity effort, record high unemployment among black and Latino youth underscores how essential it is to create job opportunities for young people of color.
The critical issue here is that the ages of 16 to 24 are make or break years for lifelong earning potential. With one out four blacks and 1 out of 6 Latinos under the age of 25 without work, a generation of youth of color risks falling behind.