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May 27, 2015
Disenfranchisement News
Alabama
House approves bill that defines which offenses result in forfeiture of voting rights
The House of Representatives recently approved a bill
that would create a definitive list of felony offenses that prohibit
people from voting. Under current law, anyone convicted of a felony
involving “moral turpitude” loses their voting rights, but Alabama’s
Constitution does not define those crimes further. Some county
registrars interpret the Constitution to mean any felony conviction
prohibits voting, while other counties use a list of offenses identified
in a previous court case.
Republican Rep. Mike
Jones, sponsor of the bill, says the goal is “to make sure we're not
keeping people from voting who should be voting." The bill identifies 38
offenses that would result in disenfranchisement, including drug
trafficking, murder, rape, theft, bigamy, and terrorism charges. A
person with a felony conviction not on the list would be eligible for
rights restoration.
Maryland
Governor vetoes bill to restore voting rights to 40,000 people
Republican Governor Larry
Hogan vetoed a bill that would have restored voting rights to people
immediately after prison, rather than waiting until they’ve completed
parole or probation. The bill would have impacted an estimated 40,000
disenfranchised Marylanders. The Senate passed the measure with the minimum votes needed to override a veto, but the House was two votes short for an override. In a letter
to legislative leaders, Governor Hogan said that restoring voting
rights to people after they have completed probation or parole "achieves
the proper balance between repayment of obligations to society for a
felony conviction and the restoration of the various restricted rights."
Communities United,
a social justice advocacy group that supported the measure, criticized
the veto saying: "Governor Hogan has learned nothing from the uprising
in Baltimore and what the city and state residents need. Freddie Gray's
West Baltimore neighborhood has the highest rate of disenfranchisement
in the state. Former felons need a voice and the ability to influence
what happens in their communities and lives."
Democratic Sen. Joan
Carter Conway says she needs to gather just a handful of votes in each
chamber to override the veto when the General Assembly convenes next
January.
Minnesota
Voting rights provision stripped from public safety bill
Due to strong Republican opposition, a provision to expand voting rights to people on probation and parole was dropped from a public safety bill negotiated by DFL Sen. Ron Latz and Republican Rep. Tony Cornish.
Sen. Latz expressed his
disappointment and said, “I have been working… to find a pathway by
which ‘Restore the Vote’ could be included in this conference committee
report. Unfortunately I finally reached the conclusion that I could not
see any pathway for that to happen.” Sen. Latz said House Republican
leadership agreed to continue working on the issue and they will try to pass a bill next year.
National
Presidential candidates call for felony disenfranchisement reform
At a recent forum in Iowa, Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton said
people with felony convictions “ought to get a second chance” to vote.
In 2005, while she was in the Senate, Clinton introduced the Count Every Vote Act
to restore voting rights to people who have completed their felony
prison, probation and parole sentence. Clinton has yet to elaborate on
whether she still supports the boundaries for felony re-enfranchisement
from her previous bill.
U.S. Sen. Rand Paul
(R-KY) has repeatedly advocated for restoring voting rights for people
convicted of certain crimes, and has made criminal justice reform a
central theme in his presidential campaign. Earlier this year, Sen. Paul
introduced the Civil Rights Voting Restoration Act, which would restore federal voting rights for people convicted of non-violent crimes.
In The Washington Post, Philip Bump recently speculated on what could have happened in the 2012 election if the 5.8 million disenfranchised Americans were allowed to vote. Using data from University of Florida professor Michael McDonald’s United States Election Project,
Bump reported that the biggest increase in voter turnout would have
been in Texas, followed by Georgia and Florida. He noted that the
always-contested state of Florida is interesting because “the number of
people who could gain the right to vote and then actually vote is twice
the margin of victory for Obama in the state.”
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sentencing policy, addressing unjust racial disparities and practices,
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