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Advocacy Blog
Monday, May 12, 2008
Missouri Lawmakers Want to Require Proof of Citizenship to Vote
According to a May 12, 2008 story in the New York Times— Voter ID Battle Shifts to Proof of Citizenship — lawmakers in Missouri are expected to support a constitutional amendment that would enable election officials to require proof of citizenship to register as a voter in the state. Sponsors of the amendment — which requires the approval of voters to go into effect— argue that it is necessary to prevent illegal immigrants from voting.
Jon Greenbaum, a former voting rights official at the Department of Justice and now the director of the voting rights project at the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, a liberal advocacy group, is quoted in the article, saying,
"Everyone has been focusing on voter ID laws generally, but the most pernicious measures and the ones that really promise to prevent the most eligible voters from voting is what we see in Arizona and now in Missouri."
The amendment pending in Missouri follows the recent Supreme Court decision in April in Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, in which the Court ruled that Indiana could require photo-ID of voters at the polls.
Arizona is currently the only state that requires proof of citizenship to register to vote. Since the requirement was implemented in 2004, more than 38,000 voter registration applications have been rejected by Arizona election officials.
For more on the repercussions of the recent Supreme Court voter ID decision, see OMB Watch's blog — Supreme Court Voter ID Consequences.
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