[EL] Adventures in Voter ID

Tue Mar 13 15:31:36 PDT 2012

One of the reasons I so love Oregon's vote by mail is that is dispenses with the disparate treatment voters receive from underinformed and undereducated poll workers.  I have had my own difficulties in getting a poll worker to do the ballot right - for example, in a primary election insisting on giving me both a Republican and Democratic ballot when the primaries are not open. However, one year while I was working as a poll worker myself, I saw other poll workers so bad they prompted me to call Elections several times during the day to try to get them to do something. 

I worked a voting station for two precincts. The folks for other precinct were on the other side of the gym. They were grossly ill-informed about the election law on provisional ballots and were refusing to allow people to cast provisional ballots at all - which is an option for someone traveling and away from home. They can cast votes on the statewide and initiatives - but not the local. It is also the option for challenged voters. 

They were also challenging voters and not allowing them to cast a provisional ballot. Of course, the people came over to our table and we allowed them to vote on provisional ballots but the folks across the way were challenging so many people that we ran out of provisional ballots by midafternoon When I went to talk to them, they were so obnoxious with their "we have been doing this for 30 years so we know how to do it" argumentativeness that tells me they didn't even listen during training because they had been doing it for 30 years. Every challenged vote was african-american or hispanic. Every one of the poll workers was white. I cannot know that there frequent challenges were based on prejudice since it people of color are the majority in the district, but I think they were.  I also discovered when I went to talk with the about the challenges that the coffee they were drinking out of their thermoses was not coffee but some alcoholic cocktail. They were not so drunk they could not function at all, but they were certainly unfit, obnoxious and loudly laughing and cracking jokes while people stood in line waiting for their attention. They acted like it was a party and they got to decide who was invited. 

I called Elections for more ballots which arrived in a couple of hours - but nothing was done about the drinking poll workers at the time - there were no folks to come take over. 

I was so glad that the next election was vote by mail. 

RuthAlice Anderson

On Mar 13, 2012, at 8:22 AM, Edward Still wrote:

> I went to vote in the primary this morning. I showed my Medicare card to the polling official. She said, "We need something with your address on it."
> 
> Me: "No, ma'am, you don't. This is an acceptable form of identification under the law." [Ala. Code § 17-9-30.]
> 
> She: "Let me go check this on the computer." 
> 
> In the meantime, the other polling official has found my name on the poll book.
> 
> The first polling official can't find whatever it is she is looking for "on the computer" and walks to a sign by the entrance. The sign lists all the acceptable forms of ID. Finally, she returns with my ID and says, "If he is on the book, let him vote."
> 
>  The justification usually given by Republican legislators pushing voter-ID laws is the prevention of impersonation of the voter. The theory has been that a Social Security card, a Medicare card, etc. are so valuable that I will not let it out of my possession. Those government ID do not have my address on them, nor does my passport -- the gold standard of government-issued picture IDs. So, why did the poll worker ask for an "address ID"? Perhaps she had been told that in training.
> 
> Being a poll official is a tough job. I know because I have served as one. But it is made tougher by training that tells poll workers that the purpose of an ID is to check my address.
> 
> 
> 
> Edward Still
> Edward Still Law Firm LLC
> 130 Wildwood Parkway, Suite 108, PMB 304
> Birmingham AL 35209
> 205-320-2882 (voice & fax)
>   still at votelaw.com 
>   www.votelaw.com/blog
>   www.edwardstill.com
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