Tennessee elections chief accused of intimidation for telling 14,375 voters to prove citizenship
Republican secretary of state sends vaguely worded letter to voters weeks before primary
Tennessee’s top election official asked more than 14,000 registered voters to prove their citizenship in a vaguely worded letter last month in what voting and immigrant groups say is an attempt to intimidate voters.
The office of the Tennessee secretary of state, Tre Hargett, a Republican, sent the letter to 14,375 voters on 13 June, weeks before early voting was to begin for the state’s August primary. “Our office has received information that appears to indicate that your voter information matches with an individual who may not have been a United States citizen at the time of obtaining a Tennessee license or ID card,” the letter says.
It goes on to remind the recipient that illegal voting is a felony in Tennessee punishable with up to two years in prison and a $5,000 fine. It requests that any person who received the letter who is a citizen provide proof, such as a US passport, birth certificate, naturalization papers or other document.
The letter offers no information about what happens if someone does not reply. It also offers no information on how their names were flagged for review. Doug Kufner, a spokesman for Hargett, did not return requests for comment.
Honest question, can you vote without ID in the US? To me, asking for ID (or any sort of proof of citizenship and age) seems completely normal, since those are the two requirements for being eligible for voting, citizenship and being over 18 years old.
That is a state by state question. The problem people have with it, is that it frequently is done in bad faith. Here's a few examples. Alabama has been known to shut down the places where you can get proper identification in certain areas, making it so that you have to travel long distances to get the id. Something poor people have a harder time doing. North Carolina has been proven in court to do preliminary research about what kind of ID black people tend not to have, before passing a law requiring that specific ID. Texas required IDs have your exact name on it. That doesn't sound like a much of an issue, until you realize they did it months before the election, and their system for updating it takes longer. Any one who had changed their name, such as women who had taken their husband's name, would not have been allowed to vote had it not been delayed by the courts.
Wow, what the fuck? Also can you vote without identification in some States? Won't that lead to voting fraud, eg people not eligible to cast a vote being able to vote
I was an election monitor in the US. I am not aware of a state that lets anyone walk in and vote without any form of ID. If your ID is incorrect or cannot be confirmed, your vote is provisional and you have the opportunity to fix the issue.
There are plenty of states where you can vote without having to show identification at the time of voting. You do have to register prior to voting, though, and that process requires identification and proof of residency. And no, none of this has ever resulted in any significant voting fraud. Between 2000 and 2014 there were only 31 documented cases of voter impersonation in the entire country.
https://ballotpedia.org/Voter_identification_laws_by_state