SCOTUS Upholds Ohio's Inactive Voter Purging in 5-4 Vote

[MarkD]

Thanks to a Slate article on this ruling, I'm leaning toward the conclusion that the majority in this SCOTUS decision has made a significant mistake.

[muon2]

Thanks to a Slate article on this ruling, I'm leaning toward the conclusion that the majority in this SCOTUS decision has made a significant mistake.

I think it's worth reading the actual opinions as I did. The key fact in the Slate article is this:

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I think Slate is echoing Steven's deeper concerns which also appeared with Sotomayor. The law has a disparate impact on minority populations. However, this case was about the federal law not the underlying constitutional claim. Slate also wants this to be about the constitutionality of voter purges.

I go back to my previous post. USPS changes of address miss a lot of relocations, and even more deaths of registered voters. The NVRA was supposed to both cut out political purges, but make sure that states kept up-to-date records. The puzzle now is how to achieve both.

[Progressive Pessimist]

I'm so done with this country. I guess I've been done with it for awhile though.

[Dr. MB]

What a terrible ruling.

That's all I can say.

[7,052,770]

There should be no such thing as "voter rolls" or "registration."

[Dr Oz Lost Party!]

This is just evil and undemocratic. Trump celebrating it shows the GOP knows they can't fairly win elections anymore.

[Adam Griffin]

Literally all you have to do to stay on the rolls is confirm your residency once a decade. It is so dumb that this is even contested. The law states that not only is this system of maintaining your rolls allowable, it is in fact a requirement that many states ignore.

If Ohio were purging voters for failing to vote, it would be a different story. But that’s not what they’re doing. They’re asking for confirmation of residence in the event you stop voting, which is an entirely different thing.

You ought to have to confirm your residence once in a while to maintain voting eligibility, because people move without telling the state all the time. It is just bizarre that so many people thing the SOS basicallyy should refuse to do their job because it might ‘disenfranchise minority voters’, as if this policy is being applied in an uneven manner. If minority voters do not respond to confirm their residency why should they be subject to different laws from white voters?

Is it too much to ask the state to coordinate voter registration verification with the DMV? My state and a variety of others have moved to doing this. Licenses generally have to be renewed every 5-10 years pretty much everywhere. It's a bit ridiculous to require (most) voters to engage in 2 forms of verification every decade when 1 would suffice.  


One question I do have after reading the above post is: does everybody have to confirm their address at regular intervals in OH, or just those who haven't voted in the past 2 general elections?

There should be no such thing as "voter rolls" or "registration."

[KingSweden]

Literally all you have to do to stay on the rolls is confirm your residency once a decade. It is so dumb that this is even contested. The law states that not only is this system of maintaining your rolls allowable, it is in fact a requirement that many states ignore.

If Ohio were purging voters for failing to vote, it would be a different story. But that’s not what they’re doing. They’re asking for confirmation of residence in the event you stop voting, which is an entirely different thing.

You ought to have to confirm your residence once in a while to maintain voting eligibility, because people move without telling the state all the time. It is just bizarre that so many people thing the SOS basicallyy should refuse to do their job because it might ‘disenfranchise minority voters’, as if this policy is being applied in an uneven manner. If minority voters do not respond to confirm their residency why should they be subject to different laws from white voters?

Is it too much to ask the state to coordinate voter registration verification with the DMV? My state and a variety of others have moved to doing this. Licenses generally have to be renewed every 5-10 years pretty much everywhere. It's a bit ridiculous to require (most) voters to engage in 2 forms of verification every decade when 1 would suffice.  

There should be no such thing as "voter rolls" or "registration."

Yeah if even the progressive utopia of GA can figure it out then so can all the other states

[Adam Griffin]

Yeah if even the progressive utopia of GA can figure it out then so can all the other states

And here's the guy who made it happen!

[KingSweden]

Yeah if even the progressive utopia of GA can figure it out then so can all the other states

And here's the guy who made it happen!

The cognitive dissonance of Brian friggin’ Kemp instituting AVR without any fuss whatsoever is really quite something

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

North Dakota also has no voter registration and never has in my lifetime.

[TJ in Oregon]

No idea if automatic voter registration plays a significant role, but going to the Oregon DMV is a horrendous experience compared to the Ohio DMV. You walk into the place and come to a unmanned desk with stacks of forms, lines going all over the place, no explanation of what's going on, and then proceed to wait hours even if you by a near miracle happened to guess correctly on what form you need. Back in Ohio, you might wait 10-15 minuted before getting to talk to a real person and then are given the correct forms, fill them out, and hand them in. It might take a half hour tops. Oh, and Ohio even prints drivers' licenses on the spot!

[Virginiá]

North Dakota also has no voter registration and never has in my lifetime.

Exactly. Having clean voter rolls isn't even something worth going to court over like this. Ohio already requires a non-photo ID to vote afaik, and I seriously doubt there are any bad actors waiting in the wings with expert knowledge of dead people still on the voter rolls, fully prepared to flood the system with votes. Conservative voters are overly paranoid about this when they should be more paranoid about their own party's politicians stoking fears on purpose to destroy their trust in the system (for when Democrats win) and so they can butcher our election laws for their own corrupt benefit.

If they were really open to working with people to clean the rolls but also prevent legitimate voters from being removed, there are ways to do this that don't involve some weak system that requires people to not vote and return a card. I don't really care that it takes numerous election cycles to pass by without voting. They have every right to stay registered without voting for as long as they want. If the state wants to clean their rolls, it should be on them to find better ways to do it if there are in fact better ways available. One of these no doubt includes an interstate system that states can use to keep rolls up to date - and not one like Kobach's, which compares limited data that is error-prone on purpose so it has an excuse to remove minorities and other people.

No idea if automatic voter registration plays a significant role, but going to the Oregon DMV is a horrendous experience compared to the Ohio DMV. You walk into the place and come to a unmanned desk with stacks of forms, lines going all over the place, no explanation of what's going on, and then proceed to wait hours even if you by a near miracle happened to guess correctly on what form you need. Back in Ohio, you might wait 10-15 minuted before getting to talk to a real person and then are given the correct forms, fill them out, and hand them in. It might take a half hour tops. Oh, and Ohio even prints drivers' licenses on the spot!

I dunno what their deal is but AVR doesn't have to be any kind of issue. All it is really doing is taking information the state already gets and using it to register you, and as someone with background in tech, this is like a very, very basic idea. Our whole system of elections is a monstrosity that could be fixed, made more convenient and secured far better than it is now if politicians just stepped out of the way and let people implement good, time-tested ideas. I mean, even looking at same-day registration, all it really is is inputting data on the spot into a database, and using identification of some kind to validate it. Anyone with a computer can sit there and do it in theory, and yet most states don't do this. I'd be laughing until my sides hurt at this level of incompetence if it wasn't so damn depressing.