On Tuesday, The U.K. Daily Mail posted an article about H.R.4494, introduced by Republicans to promote election integrity, voter confidence, and faith in elections by removing Federal impediments to, providing State tools for, and establishing voluntary considerations to support effective State administration of Federal elections and improving election administration in the District of Columbia, and for other purposes.
The article reports:
The 224-page package contains nearly 50 standalone bills. It would, in part, give state and local elections officials access to the Social Security death list to help them glean the names of the deceased from voter rolls.
…The legislation would incentivize states enact election security measures similar to Georgia’s – require voter ID, conduct post-election audits and enact other checks on voter eligibility. If they did so, they could be eligible for more election funding through federally funded HAVA Election Security grants.
Under the package Congress would take the reins on Washington, D.C.’s election administration – requiring the city to ask for voter ID and banning non-citizens from voting.
…Since the 2020 election, Georgia, Iowa, Florida and Texas have enacted new election security measures like limiting drop boxes and tightening voter ID requirements, while California, New York, Oregon, Virginia and Washington have rolled back certain voting requirements.
The Georgia law standardized voting hours from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. or as long as 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. It required two Saturdays of early voting instead of one and made two Sundays optional for early voting. It continued to allow absentee voting without offering a reason but requires a state-issued ID to request a ballot. The bill also banned political groups from handing out water and food to voters waiting in line at the polls and shortens runoff elections from 9 weeks to 4 weeks.
It also limited ballot drop boxes, requiring them to be placed at early voting locations and only available while the precinct is open.
After that law was enacted about 56.9 percent of registered voters showed up to vote in the 2022 midterm election – roughly the same percentage as four years earlier in the last midterm election. More people than ever cast ballots overall but the percentage stayed the same due to population growth.
It is time to clean up our voter rolls and to make sure that the person casting their ballot is who they say they are. That is simply common sense. Unfortunately, there is no way this bill will pass either the Senate or be signed by the President.