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Comment by DisjointedHunt | Hacker News Reader

>the bill would prohibit election officials from sending absentee ballots to all voters, regardless of whether they had requested them; ban using tents, garages, mobile units or any temporary structure as a polling location; further limit who could vote absentee; and add new identification requirements for voting by mail.

>Partisan poll watchers would also have more access and autonomy under the bill’s provisions, and election officials could be more harshly punished if they make mistakes or otherwise run afoul of election codes and laws.

Why does the United States allow anyone to vote without identification is a shocking question to be asking in 2021.

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Not sure the downvotes.

As a non-american(as this is a worldwide site), I was literally wondering the same thing.

Having no form of identification? That's crazy... Not knowing the specific challenges.

In Canada you don't need to have "ID" as govt form of identification, you still need to be able to identify yourself.

They offer 3 options. Passport/driver's license/provincial I'd card.

Then if you don't have that, there are secondary items like student id + utility bill, or indigenous status card.

Then lastly, you can have someone who does have ID vouch for u.

"You can still vote if you declare your identity and address in writing and have someone who knows you and who is assigned to your polling station vouch for you.

The voucher must be able to prove their identity and address. A person can vouch for only one person (except in long-term care institutions)."

Source: https://www.elections.ca/content.aspx?section=vot&dir=ids&do...

>Why does the United States allow anyone to vote without identification is a shocking question to be asking in 2021.

I feel this is a huge misconception, everyone has to identify for the most part to get your voter registration card for example, so to claim we are allowing votes without identification is false.

Voter registration usually also includes your signature which is verified on all ballots mailed or otherwise.

For example last year I had to verify that my ballot was actually coming from me since they questioned my signature as it was an old signature I used. I sent in the proper documents to update said signature and prove I am who I said I was and it was done and over with.

Exactly - IDs are required for pretty much everything else we do. Voting should be no different.

Do you still feel that way when considering how this would inhibit many people who cannot get IDs from voting? It's their right, no? Just because they don't have a means to obtain an ID doesn't mean their voice shouldn't carry weight in our democracy.

To be absolutely clear: I hope no one is suggesting that there should be any voter ID laws that aren’t preceded by ensuring people have ID (free, easy access).

The voter ID discussion should be phrased as “assuming 99.9% have ID, do you think it’s a good idea to check it when voting?”

The answer to that question is: “yes”.

The other question (much less interesting!) is “assuming ID access and possession is as skewed as today, is it a good idea to require ID for voting?”. The answer to that question is an equally easy “No”.

Why can't they get an id?

Cost. If it's $25, that's too much for some people.

Time cost. If they work 8-5, or two jobs, they can't get time off to go get an id.

That's just a few off the top of my head.

You need to identify yourself to register to vote, and to vote you have to arrive at the poll, state your name and address, and sign a sworn statement. The system is practically impossible to abuse, evidenced by the fact that there have been almost no documented cases of anyone abusing it.

The reason identification laws are bad is because they disproportionately affect black people, who are less likely to have state identification, and that is because there are many people still alive today who were born in counties that literally refused to issue birth certificates to black people. It is very easy for someone to just sit there behind a computer and question why someone might not have government identification, but think it through.

>You need to identify yourself to register to vote, and to vote you have to arrive at the poll, state your name and address, and sign a sworn statement. The system is practically impossible to abuse, evidenced by the fact that there have been almost no documented cases of anyone abusing it.

Or it's because it's rarely caught and charges are rarely pressed:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/voter-fraud-a-myth-thats-not-wh...

61 out of 63 attempts to vote fraudulently were successful, and one was rejected only because the poll worker happened to be the mother of the person they were trying to fraudulently vote as.

Until there's widespread and thorough pentesting of the election systems in various states it's impossible to say at what rate fraud does or does not occur.

Who cares? Retail one-at-a-time vote fraud doesn't scale, is extremely risky (it's a felony) and doesn't happen at problematic levels. On the other hand, disenfranchising the 13% of black Americans who lack a photo ID is obviously going to swing elections.

There's plenty of ways to commit voter fraud. The fact that the most blatant and easy to catch was so successful should be worrisome to anyone.

https://archive.ph/9NSmg#selection-3761.52-3765.466

Is this written by the Larry Levy from Bracewell & Giuliani (yes, that Rudy Giuliani), and who worked on Giuliani's 2008 primary bid? (That is, in addition to being vice chair of th Republican National Lawyers Association, as described.)

If so, perhaps he's a bit, I dunno, biased?

I point this out not to say that connection must taint the source, but because there have been many investigations for the types of in-person voter fraud tested here ("died, moved out of the jurisdiction, or been convicted of a felony at least two years earlier").

And they've found bupkis. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_impersonation_(United_St... for many of the relevant studies and court cases.

You'll notice that real-world data should be more convincing as a pen test like the WSJ editorial described specifically excluded the estimated probability needed for a valid risk assessment.

Someone could crash a tank through my front door to grab my laptop. A tiger team might even demonstrate that on a similar building to mine. But I'm not going to install anti-tank barricades to reduce the chance that already unlikely event will happen.

Permit me therefore to remain suspicious about a WSJ op-ed piece written by what appears to be someone with a strong financial and/or political reason to cast doubt on existing election security even if that doubt is unjustified.

EDIT: The 'Alan Schulkin, came under pressure resign after he was caught on tape telling the truth' is from a Project Veritas video, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Veritas#New_York_City_... :

> In a follow-up interview with the New York Post, Schulkin stated, "I should have said 'potential fraud' instead of 'fraud'". Referring to the Project Veritas operative who secretely recorded him, Schulkin said, "She was like a nuisance. I was just trying to placate her", noting that in his haste to get away from her he "was agreeing with her when I shouldn’t have been."

You'll note that Levy writes "telling the truth", but doesn't present the evidence that this is actually the truth.

Worse than getting your information from the opinion section of the WSJ is imagining that empowering a local petty tyrant to refuse a ballot to a voter is a good idea. Their policy and training is to issue a provisional ballot to virtually anyone. You really don’t want local poll workers trying to adjudicate everyone’s signature or photograph. The problem in the NY investigation was that the dead people were still registered. The report was not directed at the performance of the election department on Election Day, it was directed at the maintenance of the voter file.

Having to register to vote is the other thing that could be removed as a barrier to vote.

Re: the lack of fraud: people obviously believe (or say they believe) this is a problem. So it (giving everyone free and easy access to ID and then requiring it to vote) seems like a trivial fix to that problem of trust. I realize it’s solving a problem that might not exist, but once everyone has ID it’s an easy decision, and there are other possible benefits of having more IDs.

Sure, do it. But before you require the IDs at the polls. Seriously the days when a black mother was not allowed into a hospital and was refused a birth certificate by their county was only 50 years ago. Pretending like this isn't discriminatory isn't helping.

Because poll taxes are unconstitutional.

That does seem to be a lynchpin in many of the rulings against voter ID requirements. There's an obvious workaround: the elimination of fees for ID. That's curiously aligned with the party goal of cutting taxes, but for some reason I never see that come up in this kind of legislation.

Same reason they use Fahrenheit and Imperial measurements.

The US does not have any universally available form of government ID that is automatically given freely to all citizens, therefore any piece of photo id is behind a paywall of some kind. Voting should not be limited to only those who hold a passport, or a driver's license, etc.

Other democracies have very liberal requirements on what constitutes an ID, and they do just fine. For example, here's the list of acceptable identification documents to participate in Canadian elections. https://www.elections.ca/content.aspx?section=vot&dir=ids&do...

The list covers everything from parolee cards, health cards (which are issued free of charge), firearm licenses, to letters of residency from a homeless shelter/soup kitchen, thus ensuring everyone can vote regardless of which walk of life they are from.

It's also worth noting that this law is not being passed in good faith to protect the integrity of elections, as there is little to no evidence that there is a threat. It is a partisan attempt to limit the voting rights of groups that for various reasons typically don't have identification cards, as there is significant overlap between those people and those who tend to vote in opposition to the those currently in power.

If all US states had free, easy-to-use programs to ensure that all residents had useful government-provided ID, or a common, free, federally-provided ID, this wouldn't be an issue. However, that is not the case, and so long as the requirement to have an ID costs money, it effectively amounts to a poll tax that serves to suppress low-income voters.

In practice, most people in most states probably do vote with IDs, since providing your ID is the easiest way for the poll workers to find your registration. And of course in the processes most people use to register to vote, some (if not multiple) form(s) of identification must generally be provided. The reality is that no significant ID-solved voter fraud exists in the US, so while nice in principle, voter ID laws only serve to suppress voter turnout.

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