Election Protection Fields Nearly 800 Calls During North Carolina and Indiana Primary...

Election Protection Fields Nearly 800 Calls During North Carolina and Indiana
Primary Elections
Indiana Voter ID Law Emerges as a Significant Issue; Scattered Problems
Reported Throughout Both Primary States

WASHINGTON, May 6 /PRNewswire/ -- As polls closed across both North
Carolina and Indiana this evening, the Election Protection Coalition reported
receiving nearly 800 calls to the Voter Protection Hotline throughout the day.
Election Protection and its diverse group of partners, which comprises the
nation's largest nonpartisan voter protection coalition, responded to voting
problems through a comprehensive voter protection program. Nearly 100 citizen
and legal volunteers answered calls on the 1-866-OUR-VOTE Hotline and
monitored polling places throughout both primary states.
Jonah Goldman, director of the National Campaign for Fair Elections of the
Lawyers' Committee for Civil Right's Voting Rights Project said, "As this
historic primary season has progressed, record numbers of voters have turned
out to exercise their fundamental right to vote. It is unfortunate, however,
that many of these eligible voters were disenfranchised and unable to cast a
ballot. In state after state, including both North Carolina and Indiana,
we've seen eligible voters lose their right to vote because of poorly trained
poll workers, problems with voting machines and inaccurate voter registration
rolls."
"Today, Election Protection volunteers spoke to thousands of voters. We
protected voting rights by answering questions, resolving problems, and
advocating on behalf of voters. We learned that students, elderly persons,
women, persons of color and even nuns are at risk of disenfranchisement," said
Myrna Perez, counsel at the Brennan Center.
One of the most closely watched issues going into the primaries today was
Indiana's photo identification law, requiring voters to present a government
issued ID before casting a vote. Election Protection received a significant
number of calls and complaints regarding the law, which was recently upheld by
the US Supreme Court. In one example, a freshman student at St. Mary's
College in South Bend, Indiana, called the coalition hotline after she was
denied the right to vote because she only possessed an ID from a private
college. The poll workers, nuns at a local convent, were trying to help the
young student through her problem. While doing so, and prior to the student's
incident, they realized that some of their fellow nuns were also prevented
from voting because of Indiana's restrictive photo identification law. In
fact, they later realized that several floors of retired nuns in their convent
would not be able to vote in the Indiana Primary Election.
"I saw many instances throughout the day where people were not able to
vote because of confusion about Indiana's photo ID law, both among voters and
poll workers," said John Borkowski, Esquire, a partner at law firm Hogan &
Hartson and Lawyers' Committee board member who witnessed this incident
firsthand. "The law definitely had the effect of preventing many people who
were highly motivated to participate in this primary election from exercising
their right to vote. It seems very ironic to me that a law intended to
prevent voter fraud prevented members of a single community, essentially a
family, who have lived together for years, from accepting the votes of their
own sisters."
Confusion about voter ID requirements in Indiana threatened to prevent a
registered member of the military from voting-a caller reported to Election
Protection that poll workers refused to accept his current U.S. Military ID,
claiming that it was insufficient identification. Fortunately, the caller was
able to speak with a precinct judge who corrected the poll workers.
Students also experienced problems in both states. In Indiana, students at
Purdue University weren't able to use their state-issued photo IDs to vote
because the cards lack an expiration date, while in North Carolina multiple
students who had registered by the deadline were still denied the right to
vote.
Problems emerged with absentee ballots as well. Voters at a nursing home
in Hancock County, Indiana received incorrect absentee ballots-residents who
had requested Democratic ballots received Republican ballots, and vice versa.
Other Indiana incidents include:
-- Multiple reports of voting machine problems, including from a school
teacher who had to leave without casting a ballot because he had to
get to school before classes started. Some voters were not offered
paper ballots when machines went down, and countless voters left
without casting a ballot.
-- A voter, previously convicted of a misdemeanor, was prevented from
voting by a poll worker. Election Protection provided him with the
code provision which dictates that only those convicted of a felony
and those incarcerated cannot vote.

Additional North Carolina reports include:
-- Poll workers at a local precinct announced at 6:20 a.m. that there
were no ballots and voters were sent home. Election Protection
followed up and discovered that the polling place had the ballots in a
box which had not been opened.
-- Election Protection has also received multiple reports of registered
Independents who were not allowed to vote in either primary, or were
given Republican ballots despite believing they were registered as
Democrats at polling sites.

The Lawyers' Committee, along with primary May 6 partners, Democracy North
Carolina, the Brennan Center for Justice and NAACP Legal Defense Fund, and
other partners across both states recruited, trained and deployed legal
volunteers to help voters at the polls, in the courts and through the 1-866-
OUR-VOTE Hotline. As Election Protection's interim report on previous
primaries across the country this election year suggests, the infrastructure
that supports the nation's election system often breaks down preventing
countless eligible voters from accessing their right to vote.
For more information about Election Protection and the 1-866-OUR-VOTE and
Hotline, or to read the Lawyers' Committee's report, please visit
www.866ourvote.org.
The Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law is a
nonpartisan public policy and law institute that focuses on fundamental issues
of democracy and justice, including voting rights and fair elections. Visit
www.brennancenter.org for more.
The Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (LCCRUL), a nonpartisan,
nonprofit organization, was formed in 1963 at the request of President John F.
Kennedy to involve the private bar in providing legal services to address
racial discrimination. The principal mission of the Lawyers' Committee is to
secure, through the rule of law, equal justice under law, particularly in the
areas of housing, community development, employment, voting, education and
environmental justice. For more information about the LCCRUL, visit
www.lawyerscommittee.org.
SOURCE Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law

Stacie B. Miller of Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law,
+1-202-662-8317, +1-202-445-6101 (cell), smiller@lawyerscommittee.org, or Tim
Bradley of Brennan Center for Justice, +1-646-452-5637, or +1-314-440- 9936