In reversal, judge blocks Pa. voter ID
Kathryn Whitecotton covers her personal information as she shows her Pennsylvania driver's license and her address update card outside the PennDOT Driver's License Center in Butler, Pa., Sept. 26, 2012. / AP Photo
Just five weeks before the November general election, a Pennsylvania judge reversed himself and blocked the state's strict voter identification law.
Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson issued a preliminary injunction Tuesday against the new law. He said that election workers can ask voters for ID, but photo ID will not be required to vote in the upcoming election.
Tuesday's decision is a sharp contrast to Simpson's ruling in August when he refused to issue an injunction and upheld the law. In that opinion, Simpson said the law "is a reasonable, non-discriminatory, non-severe burden when viewed in the broader context of the widespread use of photo ID in daily life."
- Judge halts Pa.'s strict new voter ID law
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- Pa. law hampers some voters from getting IDs
He also said that opponents of the voter ID law "did an excellent job of 'putting a face' to those burdened by this new requirement," but he did not "have the luxury of deciding this issue based on my sympathy for the witnesses."
Opponents appealed his decision to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. After hearing arguments from both sides, the Supreme Court returned the case to Simpson and ordered him to "reassess" his ruling based on the availability of ID cards and in light of "expedited" efforts put forth by the Pennsylvania government.
Simpson's decision may not be the final word on this case. It can be appealed back to the state Supreme Court, which is next scheduled to meet Oct. 15 in Pittsburgh.
The voter ID law was signed into law by Republican Gov. Tom Corbett in March. The law generally requires voters to present a photo identification card in order to cast a ballot. Pennsylvania is one of 10 states that have passed ID laws in the past two years.
Opponents argue the law could create "a very large problem" for as many as half a million voters in Pennsylvania. They argue that a disproportionate number of those impacted would be racial minorities, the elderly and other vulnerable groups.
In Tuesday's opinion, Simpson admitted that he might have been mistaken in his earlier assessment.
"I expected more photo IDs to have been issued by this time," he said.
At the hearings, evidence was presented that between 9,300 and 9,500 Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) IDs for voting had been issued in addition to between 1,300 and 1,350 Department of State (DOS) IDs.
"Consequently, I am not still convinced in my predictive judgment that there will be no voter disenfranchisement ... Under these circumstances, I am obliged to enter a preliminary injunction," Simpson said in his ruling Tuesday.
During last week's hearing, he hinted that he would block at least part of the law.
"I'm giving you a heads-up," he told lawyers in the case. "I think it is a possibility that there could be an injunction here."
In briefings filed Friday, the government argued that there have been reasonable voter education efforts, available means for procuring identification, and reasonable time for implementation.
Per the judge's order, the parties had to offer suggestions on what kind of injunction would be appropriate if the judge was to grant one.
The government suggested that the court could do away with the requirement that electors apply for a PennDOT ID prior to applying for a free DOS ID, and they also suggested a waiver for anyone who shows up at the polls without an ID.
Under the original law, any voter rejected for lack of ID could still cast a provisional ballot and then produce an approved ID within six days to have their vote counted. On Friday, the government argued that the court could allow those filling provisional ballots to also file a form affirming that they could not get a required ID before that six-day deadline, which would allow their vote to be counted.
The petitioners said in their brief that the only proper injunction would be to "enjoin any type of enforcement of the photo identification requirements at the upcoming election for in-person voters." After the election, they argued, the court can determine what the next step should be for enforcing the law.
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This is yet another example wgy republicans cannot be trusted with control of government abd must be prevented or removed from public office.
louiville223 said, "This is how democrats really treat the millitary vote when the cameras are not rolling!!! From the 2000 election..."
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In your post, you fail to provide a source for your direct and lengthy quotation. Since the quotation is nearly all of your post, the source becomes important.
By research, the probable source can be established. CBS readers will not be surprised to learn your post quotation is found on a website named for Andrew Breitbart, the infamous "dirty tricks" fabricator of video evidence. Breitbart's last exploit (Shirley Sherrod) ended in his complete discredit and scandal. Clearly, the Breitbart site is not an authoritative source for your comments.
As it turns out, however, the Breitbart site had imported its story from still another (right-leaning) website named "Newsmax", a counterpart of Faux News, itself, and another GOP spin website. However, the actual Louiville223 quotation matches the Breitbart website, not the Newsmax source. Sharing of legitimate news stories between news outlets is commonplace, but sharing of jaundiced, fact-free political perspective, masquerading as reportage, is a mark of partisan websites.
Newsmax quotes a Washington Times reporter named Sammon, whose colorful recollection of the Florida campaign was heavily tilted toward the Bush camp. Having read the Sammon account printed in Newsmax, it seems the reporter believes the military ballot issue is key to understanding what happened in Florida in 2000. Whether his account is both factual and also representative of the election is in serious doubt.
Sammon points to a Democratic lawyer named Mark Herron, whose memo to Democratic officials is presented as a means to invalidate military ballots, not only as a legal guide for representatives of the Democratic Party. But Sammon's inference the Herron memo provides an "excuse" to invalidate a military ballot is ludicrous, since the grounds for invalidation must apply to any military ballot, regardless of how the vote is cast, on the basis of verifiable characteristics. It is also worth noting Herron's memo accurately tracks an earlier memo from GOP election registrar Katherine Harris, which states that a postmark is absolutely essential for any military ballot to be counted. It was Florida AG Robert Butterworth-- a Democrat and supporter of Al Gore-- who later told Florida counties to reconsider military ballots lacking a postmark, anyway.
What is not in doubt is Sammon does not write like a journalist, but with the emotion-laden, purple prose of a political hack. No reader can trust an account which exploits partisan emotion to make its case. Sammon works in his day job for the Washington Times (a Moon-right POV publication).
Many accounts exist of the Florida presidential election of 2000, and can be divided into various camps, not all of them partisan. Yet, the accounts that rely on analysis of all the evidence are few, since it is a truly massive undertaking.
Likewise, Sammon's account-- in potential votes lost or gained-- is not even a small fraction of the whole story. Dozens of ballot boxes in pro-Democratic counties simply disappeared, only to be found much later after the polls had closed and ballots had been officially counted. To these missing (predominantly Democratic) ballot boxes must be added the 16,000-plus votes of the Volusia Error which were intended for Gore but denied by a mysterious "problem" with a Diebold electronic voting machine. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volusia_error)
Even if Sammon's account is credited well beyond its merit, discarding tens of thousands of pro-Democratic ballots across Florida has an orders of magnitude greater effect on the election outcome. Ultimately, the sheer number of missing Democratic ballots suggest Gore should have been counted winner of the Florida contest (1) if all ballots had been found, properly counted and (2) if the statewide recount had not been halted by a partisan conservative majority of the US Supreme Court.
As it was counted nationally, the election returns showed the Democratic candidate received (officially) 527,000 more popular votes than the GOP candidate. In effect, Bush owed his presidency-- in part-- to an emergency intervention made by the US Supreme Court's conservatives, who saw an opportunity to bypass precedent and gain political advantage. Both that court and the Roberts court, both judicially activist, give the lie to their claim of impartial jurisprudence.
The biggest election hijacker of all time, however, is underreported. See-- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacking_Democracy
It is clear they want to take the country back to times of civic and racial strife. They must be rejected and defeated if our great nation is to maintain the progress it has made and move farther ahead. Republicans are a cancer on our great nation and they must be eradicated from public office.
Maybe the judge realized the cost to implement a useless system would be massive, never mind the upkeep.
Many Republicans claim to hate big government and regulations, until they themselves want to put them in!
No excuse for calling for a second form of ID when the first is pretty much bulletproof, unless you are a hermit.
Your taxes are going up also, even if your boy romey gets elected/
Here is a link.
http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/09/wendy_rosen_voter_fraud.php
If you do some googling, there are plenty of references to this.
The point is simple. Voter fraud happens. Requiring voter ID's is one step to curbing voter fraud. Have fun verifying the information about this woman.
Without that? You cannot vote or will get a provisional ballot.