Oklahoma Agrees To Bring Public Assistance Agencies into Compliance with the Law
NEW YORK, WASHINGTON and OKLAHOMA CITY (July 30, 2015)– Voting rights advocates and Oklahoma officials announced today that a settlement has been reached to provide more effective voter registration opportunities to citizens throughout the state.
Today, we reached an important agreement with the state of Oklahoma that will bring comprehensive voter registration opportunities to citizens throughout the state.
What would America look like if donors didn’t rule the world? It’s an interesting question and one worth pondering as the 2016 Presidential campaigns kick off. Available data reveals that donors not only have disproportionate influence over politics, but that influence is wielded largely to keep issues that would benefit the working and middle classes off of the table.
New U.S. Census data released on July 19 confirm what we already knew about American elections: Voter turnout in the United States is among the lowest in the developed world. Only 42 percent of Americans voted in the 2014 midterm elections, the lowest level of voter turnout since 1978. And midterm voters tend to be older, whiter and richer than the general population.
While the highest income bracket noticed a drop another source that analyzes the wealthiest one percent found that in 2008, 99 percent voted, which shows that the very peak of wealth controls most of what happens in America.
The stories of our clients—Sherry Denise Holverson, Isabel Najera, and Alexandria Lane—are not outliers, but rather represent a problem that has been occurring across the state of North Carolina.
An analysis of competitive House races in the 2014 midterms by MASSPIRG and the think tank Demos confirmed that such a program could fundamentally change the balance of power in Congressional elections.
Is it a problem when the Supreme Court is out of step with public opinion? While in many cases the answer is no, when it comes to the question of money and politics and the financing of campaigns and elections, its counter-majoritarianism is a threat to democracy.
Since America’s founding, the franchise has been dramatically expanded in waves: first, universal suffrage for all men (first, through the abolition of property ownership requirements for white men, then the 15th Amendment) then the expansion of suffrage to women and finally the Voting Rights Act, which abolished poll taxes and literacy tests.
Last night, Hillary Clinton announced several important voting reforms: expanded early voting, an end to voter ID laws, felon voting rights restoration and making election day a federal holiday. Most importantly, she came out in favor of universal, automatic voter registration.
Yesterday, presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton visited Texas Southern University, a historically black college in Houston, where she called for stronger election administration practices to protect voters. Along with asking Congress to reboot the Voting Rights Act—which had “its heart … ripped out” by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2013, Clinton said—she called for mandatory voter registration and at least 20 days of early voting.
Demos Vice President of Policy & Outreach Lenore Palladino issued the following statement on Vermont’s passage of Same-Day Registration:
"Demos applauds Vermont’s passage of Same-Day Registration (SDR), which will allow residents to register to vote and then cast a regular ballot in a one-stop process at every polling location. Every eligible American should have an equal opportunity to vote, and it should be free, fair and easily accessible. SDR is an important step to ensure this happens.
Vermont will allow voters to cast ballots the same day they register to vote, effective January 2017. It used to be that voters would need to register close to a week before casting a ballot, but that’s changing.
Republicans claim voter ID laws aren't racist, but numbers don't lie.
Sean McElwee, a researcher for progressive think tank Demos, compared measures of racist sentiments among white people in each of the 50 states (such as whether they believe blacks are trustworthy or intelligent) to dataon voting laws in each state, including when they were introduced and how strict they are.
During the 2012 and 2014 elections, thousands of Texans arrived at the polls having registered to vote at the Department of Public Safety (Texas’ motor vehicles department), only to be told that they were not on the voter rolls.
Jeff Jacoby ends his June 29 column by asserting that black citizens’ right to vote “is no longer endangered anywhere in America.” What America is he talking about?