Three results from yesterday’s elections: (1) Arizona State Senate President Russell Pearce, a staunch opponent of the state’s successful Clean Elections program, was defeated on Tuesday by a political newcomer in a recall election. Pearce is the author of Arizona’s notorious anti-immigration law. He was also tainted by a corruption scandal involving tens of thousands of dollars worth of trips and freebies connected with the Fiesta Bowl. (2) In Maine, voters overrode the conservative legislature’s decision to eliminate Election Day Registration, which allows eligible citizens to register and vote on Election Day. The program, in place since 1973, has helped Maine rank among the top two or three states for voter turnout for years. Angry at the legislature’s vote to kill EDR, a progressive coalition gained the necessary signatures, put the issue on the ballot, and won by a 60% to 40% margin. (3) On the other hand, Mississippi passed a referendum by a similar margin to require a photo ID for voters, with the promise of free IDs and backup measures to avoid disenfranchising eligible citizens. The state NAACP, ACLU and others are waiting to see how the state intends to implement the requirement before immediately challenging the proposal through the judicial system.
Get Out the Vote Category
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LOD: Guides to Voting, Anti-Voting
Tuesday, October 4th, 2011
The NC Center for Voter Education has produced a handy, on-line voter guide for local elections in more than three dozen cities. If you live in Chapel Hill or Mint Hill, Waynesville or Morrisville, Raleigh, Concord, Durham or Greenville, etc., you can see what the candidates for city council and other offices are saying about critical issues in your community. You can also learn the schedule for Early Voting and get links to find out where you vote. A powerful resource to help you be more powerful! Meanwhile, the Brennan Center for Justice has released a comprehensive guide to voter suppression efforts across the nation in 2011. The net result: new laws so far in 14 states that will seriously restrict voting opportunities affecting at least five million voters and the outcome of the 2012 elections in states with nearly two-thirds of the country’s Electoral College votes. A report on the status of North Carolina voter suppression legislation is on the Democracy North Carolina website.
LOD: Census Report on Voting
Wednesday, September 28th, 2011
The US Census Bureau is out with its biennial post-election survey of who voted – and who didn’t. You can see breakdowns of voting in the 2010 election by race, gender, education level, occupation, and so forth, often by state. For example, nationally, people in families that earned $100,000 or more were twice as likely to vote in 2010 as those in families earning less than $20,000. Social science researchers take this series of reports very seriously, but they come with an important caveat. People like to say they vote even when they don’t, so beware: In North Carolina, for example, three million people said they voted in 2010, but the State Board of Elections figures show only 2.7 million ballots were actually casts – that’s a 10% overstatement by your friends and neighbors. On the other hand, many people don’t realize they are still registered to vote even though they haven’t done so in years; the Census poll shows 4.4 million North Carolinians said they are registered but there are about one million more in active registration status. Despite these problems, the dramatic differences in rates based on education, age and income are telling. Any way you cut the numbers, we have a long way to go to compete with the level of voter participation in states like Maine, Minnesota, Oregon and Iowa.
LOD: Stir ‘Em Up, Scare ‘Em Big-Time
Monday, September 12th, 2011
The hostility of too many Tea Party fans toward people who don’t look and act like them is alarming – and dangerous. It flows from a sense of beleaguered superiority and it can produce explosive reactions when these true believers are prodded with wild claims that “our culture” (values, family, country, God, etc.) is under attack. Unfortunately, the wild claims keep coming – and they put millions of people and our overall democracy at risk. Today, Republicans in the NC House of Representative followed one blueprint to prod their reactionary supporters into action by invoking what Dr. Tim Tyson calls the threat of the gay boogieman. GOP leaders succeeded in getting enough votes in the House to put an amendment on the 2012 ballot to outlaw gay marriage, which state law already does. Several House Democrats went along, after Republicans agreed to put the measure on the primary ballot instead of holding it for November. The state Senate is likely to agree. Following a similar script, Republicans invoke images of illegal immigrants fraudulently voting in order to gin up passions about the need for a photo ID law. Yikes, here come the $&S^@(! Going even further, some right-wing pundits are ready to say “our culture” (white wealthy straight property owners) is threatened by poor people voting at all. “Registering them to vote is like handing out burglary tools to criminals. It is profoundly antisocial and un-American to empower the nonproductive segments of the population to destroy the country,” says Matthew Vadem in the American Thinker. As Facing South points out, Vadem is simply voicing a growing sentiment among the far-rightists whose earlier inflammatory positions are now mainstream conservative thought.
LOD: Graphic View of Voter Reg
Wednesday, August 24th, 2011
The John W. Pope Civitas Institute deserves its reputation for biased polling and twisted thinking, but it can sometimes be a useful place to see statistics from a government source presented in a nifty format – in this case, county-by-county voter registration details. (Ironic, right? Civitas roundly trashes the government, including the State Board of Elections, the source of this feature, and then uses the tax-financed government agency’s data for its untainted private purposes. But, of course, Civitas is not wholly private; it’s a tax-subsidized think tank, funded almost entirely by tax-sheltered profits from Art Pope’s Roses/Maxway family corporation, funneled through the John W. Pope Foundation to Civitas. Democracy NC is a tax-subsidized nonprofit, too, and thanks for your financial support!) But back to the nifty format: This presentation lets you quickly see the change in voter registration in your county and across the state; change the dates in the window for a longer view; hover your cursor over the county name to see race and party details; and export data to an Excel file. Statewide, because of list maintenance, there are 60,500 fewer Republicans and 136,000 fewer Democrats registered now than in November 2008, and 91,000 additional voters registered as Unaffiliated.
Putting it all in perspective:
Friday, July 15th, 2011
I brought my 13-year old daughter with me last Wednesday to Democracy NC’s voting rights rally so she could balance way too many episodes of “Millionaire Matchmaker” and “Dawson’s Creek” with a dose of real life. She got it in spades, too, when a man arriving for the counter-protest mounted by AFP was rude to us on the way in, launching into a “you people need to take a test before you are allowed to vote” tirade when he saw our signs opposing voter photo ID. This led to a good discussion with my child over the various forms of suppressing the vote used throughout history, including tests, but it also underscored, all too vividly, how irresponsible media coverage and irresponsible rightwing politicians have used this issue to fan the flames of fear and polarize America even more. I’m not sure who “you people” is exactly — the guy looked like very other guy I went to high school with and we could have been siblings — but it is a sad commentary on the state of political debate in our country today.
Something happened at the rally, though, to put it all into perspective and to underscore the importance of Bob Hall’s call to action on protecting voter rights — “If you’re old enough to vote, you’re old enough to fight.” As with all profound moments, it arrived unexpectedly. We were gathering together under a couple of trees on the General Assembly lawn, distributing signs and flags, when I noticed a large group of what I thought were Asian tourists snapping photographs of our crowd. I just figured they had stumbled on our group and, because of how racially-diversified we were, with people of all ages present, thought it an interesting memory to take home with them. But then a small woman with the group came to up to me and put her arm around me and said, “We wanted to be here to support you in your fight for democracy.” I was heartened — and baffled — until Melissa Price of NCVCE arrived to explain that the group was actually a State Department-sanctioned delegation of democracy activists from South Korea touring America to see, among other things, democracy in action. All of the people in the delegation worked for various non-profits in their country devoted to democracy and good government. Some had gone to jail for their work, one man for three years.
It’s hard to complain about the heat and a few rude counter-protesters when you think about people going to jail because they are advocating for rights we take for granted. Rights that some of us, in fact, take so much for granted that they are perfectly willing to strip their fellow countrymen of those rights. Fighting for the right of ALL citizens to vote, without interference and harassment from the other side — be it in your face or in the chambers of the legislature or at the polling place — is noble and necessary work. Here’s to our counterparts across the waters (shown below). We’ll keep on fighting if you will.
– Katy Munger
A delegation of democracy and good government activists from South Korea, shown with their host for the day, Melissa Price Kromm of North Carolina Voters for Clean Elections.
And Tour Stops Start…
Friday, June 17th, 2011
Another week in Charlotte…
Our week started with a planning day. We went to the office and set our goals on the table then later we made phone calls to prepare for our tour stop that was to begin the next day.
Tuesday morning called for our full and undivided attention as we made our way to Asheville, North Carolina. We met each other at 7:45am to leave for the city and reached there by 9:30. We immediately started speaking with people because from the way we planned the day, we were to meet with eight different people back-to-back. Surprisingly, we were able to fit a media sitting in the day which cost us a little more time than we budgeted for. We were featured in an Asheville radio show on WREC 100.7 FM and were pleased with our new accomplishment. We spoke briefly on being stripped of the right to vote and swiftly shifted our focus back to our planned one-on-ones. Later that evening, we met with about 16 concerned people in a chocolate & coffee lounge. The meeting was beneficial in our planning of the research aspect of our internship. We are to hold a large meeting on what we hope to establish and work on depending on what we assume the results of the bad bills would be.
Wednesday was just as filled as the last. We woke up even earlier and headed to Raleigh, North Carolina, met with the other Democracy Summer teams and watched the state’s General Assembly work. We also had the pleasure of hearing some of the representatives of the house and senate speak and explain to us the importance of being involved. Overall, we found the trip both fascinating and exhilarating.
On Thursday we went into the office and started working on an event we plan on having in Asheville on the 16th of July. We have defined the prescribed outcomes for our research assignment as a well thoroughly planned out an event complimenting the faith, cause and community based organizations to find a way to protect voting rights on a larger scale.
Today, Friday we are researching and further planning the structure for our overall goals for Asheville.
Tune in next week…
The Great Adventures of The Charlotte Team..
Monday, June 13th, 2011
This week in Charlotte…
It’s been another eventful week! Monday started off with scrupulous amounts of planning for meetings that were to be held in the upcoming days. In the evening, we also met with Mary Klenz from Legal Women Voters along with Advocate Tom Bowers, in order to discuss the details of our scheduled meeting with Governor Bev Purdue’s Assistant Budd Berro the next morning. Roles were assigned and we all parted ways to rehearse our parts for the next day. It was interesting to see how different types of advocacy organization could come together to strengthen their platform and get their voices heard. The meeting was supposed to be about the budget, yet because we were there show our support, we were invited to speak about our issues as well. The group was mainly speaking about how education and environmental factors were several affected by the budget. A man named Mr. Greene made a remarkable observation that really stuck out to us; “It’s scary to me how many things are being affected by one budget. It’s like their using the budget to get away with all these things.”
The next morning, we found ourselves downtown at the government building yawning and entering a welcoming room in the government building at 8:15am. We met with about 6 others who were to accompany us in the meeting and discuss other issues that they felt needed to be addressed. Our first meeting was with Governor’s Assistant Budd Berro. We listened as he explained that he was in charge of the piedmont regional office under Governor Perdu and then introduced ourselves. The meeting began with our group mentioning its strong concern for the environment. About 15 minutes later, we went into education and then ended off with voting rights. Joyce was unable to speak at the engagement because she had laryngitis thus the weight fell on Maiysa and Robert. We think that the meeting went well because we spent a good amount of time expressing how we felt about the current issues that are being overlooked. Next we headed down the hall to a meeting on redistricting. We were attentive yet we were victims to boredom. There were two men on the end that really irked our nerves because we felt that they were either being very obnoxious and not understanding or we felt that they were being too vague to understand. We learned plenty on redistricting that day, and came to appreciate the intricate process involved in redistricting and the time the volunteer appointed committee puts into it.
Wednesday came with anticipation of our very first one-on-one. We had set up a meeting with Monica Embrey of Green Peace. We really enjoyed speaking with her because she was so understanding and alive. We gave her several contacts and in exchange, she told us that she wanted to help support our efforts. We could really see how organization could jump to each other’s professional aid. Next, we found ourselves heading to the homeland security building to help the League of Women Voters with the voter registrations. It was amazing. We had the privilege of witnessing about 98 people, from 52 different nations, become US citizens and pledge into our country. During the ceremony, we prepared the documents of voter registry and after we made sure everyone had them. Not many were interested in hearing about extra information that would help them to vote so we just stood at the door, ready and available to inform. We expected people to be itching to know all the details about their new right but they didn’t seem as excited. Though we weren’t bombarded with questions as we had predicted, it was still an exquisite experience seeing the lives of so many change, before our eyes, within minutes.
On Thursday, we had our 1st media appearance. We were really excited when we walked in the studio and yet a little nervous. Upon our wait, a woman named Joyce Waddell entered the room and graced us with her loving, warm presence. She smiled very vividly and asked us some questions about ourselves. At the time, Joyce’s voice was not yet 100% so against Dr. Waddell’s it sounded quite rough. Her aura reminded us of someone very calmly sitting on the couch of a welcoming home and her voice matched her graciously. When the camera finally got rolling we began to relax as we spoke with her. We still remember the beautiful light blue sequence dress that lit up the set while we fed her the answers that she anticipated hearing. She gently glanced from the camera to us in increments of 30-40 seconds while we asked each other with our eyes who was ready to answer the next question. About an hour and a half of this, we left the room swiftly and mentally satisfied with our accomplishment. For the most part we felt prepared but then again we hadn’t had all the answers to all the questions. We couldn’t help but to feel responsible even though we knew it wasn’t our fault. Some of the questions she asked us, on and off the camera were ones that just hadn’t crossed our minds. Briefly after, Robert went to fidget in Dr. Waddell’s hot seat while we talked about our performance and waited in a different room. Overall, it was a learning experience and we decided that we did not like having to answer unexpected questions on the spot but we could do it fairly well. The episode will air on the 28th of this month on channel 21, “Public Access” at 9:30pm. Be watching.
Friday was our most hectic day yet. Unfortunately because of all the excitement from our television appearance from the day before, we had been unable to check our email to realize that the Team Conference call was scheduled for the following day. In frenzy, we received calls from Robert Friday morning informing us of the mishap and we quickly got on our phones and dialed away. It was nice to hear about the different things the Greenville and Winston-Salem teams had already accomplished this summer and comforting to learn that we were all encountering as well as overcoming similar struggles. After this, we arrived at the office to arrange last minute details for our event that night. We were asked to contact several news stations to ensure that they had received our press release and guarantee that they would be in attendance. At first it seemed that not one of the news stations would be coming. To make matters worse our office printer seemed to not cooperate and would not print any of the needed materials. 4 o’clock was approaching fast. Alas, in the last half hour, everything seemed to fall into place. One of the organizers, Hector, for Action NC (with whom we share the office) helped us by allowing us to print our materials from his printer. He also gave us contacts to different Hispanic news papers that would want to be informed of the Racial Justice Event. With everything finally accounted for, we packed up our cars and headed to the event – but little did we know the worst was yet to come….
When we arrived to the event, it was a pleasure to find that the Hispanic news papers had in fact shown up. But the projector and the film that was to be shown later that night had not. The press conference started within minutes entailing that we had a mere half hour before the crowd made its way down stairs for the film showing. When the film finally did arrive, we found ourselves in another set of turmoil. As it turned out, the laptop we had planned to use was not adaptable to the DVD we were using. As the crowd filled the room, we found a DVD player that could play the film, but of course the wiring for the video player was missing. The only thing left to do was too look for another laptop. As luck would have it, one of the speakers had a laptop in his car that he allowed us to borrow. We held our breaths as we inserted the DVD and waited for Windows Media Player to start up. Alas, the film was finally playing. We now turned our attention to the projector, which had been working fine all this time. To our dismay, the projector shut off and would not turn back on. While we were having our technical difficulties, the coordinators of the event had been running a Q&A session with the audience but they were running out of topics to discuss. Thus, they turned to us to speak to the group. We informed them of our views on the voting rights bill and why we were so passionate about it while passing out 60 or so flyers. We also spoke to the crowd about the Cut the Strings campaign and asked them to sign our petition. We were at a loss of what to do about the film. As we stood there flabbergasted, a man in a black suit entered the room dragging a trolley bag behind him. He approached us and asked if we needed a projector. We stared at him. It was music to our ears. We helped him set his equipment and smiled joyfully as the film, At Death House Door, finally began playing. We sat down to enjoy the film. Everything had finally worked out. The event lasted roughly three hours and in the end we were exhausted! As we said our farewells to everyone there, we looked at each other with looks of relief and finally went off for the weekend…
Coming up this week… a tour of Ashville…and a much anticipated trip to Raleigh with the rest of the Democracy Summer teams!
Maiysa Mesbah and Joyce Lutu
LOD: NC Ranks 4th on Voting Index
Friday, June 10th, 2011
According to a new analysis by Rock the Vote, only three states (Washington, Iowa and Montana) have better policies to help young people participate in elections than North Carolina. We tie with Oregon in fourth place and 45 states rank below us, with neighbors South Carolina and Virginia tied for dead last! This Voting System Scorecard measures state laws and policies in three areas: voter registration, voting procedures and young voter preparation. The other states in the top four have longer histories of promoting civic participation and their voter turnout rates are typically among the best in the nation. Several features that helped North Carolina climb to fourth place are relatively new (e.g., Same Day Registration, pre-registration for teenagers), We have yet to fulfill our potential for sustaining a turnout rate among registered voters close to the 70% level we achieved in 2008. Rather than help, the new crowd at the General Assembly (especially those backed by funding from Art Pope) are promoting bills that will make voting more difficult and lower our score on the Voting System Scorecard from 12.8 to 6.8 points (see page 17 of the report highlights).
Active Voters Without A Photo ID:
Wednesday, March 9th, 2011
For additional information, contact Bob Hall, Democracy North Carolina, 919-489-1931
Data Highlight: Who Are the Active Voters Without A Photo ID?
Who are the voters most likely to face barriers by a proposal to require voters to show a government-issued photo ID each time they vote?
In early February, the State Board of Elections matched its database of 6.1 million registered voters with records at the Division of Motor Vehicles and learned that 1 million voters did not have a NC driver’s license or identification card with a matching name and address – a current, valid NC photo ID.
Now, additional research by the State Board of Elections shows that out of the 1 million voters:
● 114,000 matched except for a variation in name (e.g., women who changed their last name).
● 334,000 had other types of mismatching information but some indication they had an ID
That leaves 554,000 registered voters with no indication that a match exists:
● 95,000 of the 554,000 are classified as Inactive registered voters who have not voted for several years.
● 460,500 are Active registered voters with no indication of a NC current and valid ID.
Out of the 6.1 million registered voters, 5.6 million are classified as Active.
Democracy North Carolina has compared the demographic profile of the 460,500 Active voters who lack a state-issued ID with the 5.6 million statewide. The chart below provides the results of that analysis.
For example, while Blacks make up 22% of all Active voters, they are 32% of all Active voters without an ID. That means if you’re a Black Active voter, you’re 48% more likely to not have a current photo ID than other Active voters.
Seniors over 65 are 20% of Active voters but 32% of those with no ID. That means Seniors are 64% more likely to not have a current photo ID than other voters.
Women and Democrats are also significantly more likely to not have a current ID than men and Republicans.
Chart is also at: http://www.democracy-nc.org/downloads/VoterIDDataByRaceSexAgePartySumm.doc
|
COMPARING AMONG |
||||||
|
# |
# No |
% No |
% |
% No |
Increased |
|
|
STATE |
5,618,530 |
460,538 |
8.2% |
100.0% |
100.0% |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
White |
4,113,656 |
276,006 |
6.7% |
73.2% |
59.9% |
|
|
Black |
1,210,707 |
147,104 |
12.2% |
21.5% |
31.9% |
48% |
|
Hispanic, |
272,236 |
27,588 |
10.1% |
4.8% |
6.0% |
24% |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Age |
592,803 |
48,331 |
8.2% |
10.6% |
10.5% |
|
|
Age |
1,350,860 |
100,437 |
7.4% |
24.0% |
21.8% |
|
|
Age |
2,499,478 |
162,772 |
6.5% |
44.5% |
35.3% |
|
|
Age |
1,108,107 |
148,988 |
13.4% |
19.7% |
32.4% |
64% |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Men |
2,531,811 |
162,640 |
6.4% |
45.1% |
35.3% |
|
|
Women |
3,037,121 |
290,521 |
9.6% |
54.1% |
63.1% |
17% |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Republicans |
1,784,608 |
111,665 |
6.3% |
31.8% |
24.2% |
|
|
Democrats |
2,513,385 |
266,269 |
10.6% |
44.7% |
57.8% |
29% |
|
Unaffiliated |
1,310,602 |
82,140 |
6.3% |
23.3% |
17.8% |
|
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Tuesday, February 1st, 2011
The national Democratic Party’s selection of Charlotte for its 2012 Convention means President Obama has no intention of conceding the Southern states he won in 2008 (Virginia, Florida, North Carolina). The NC Republican Party quickly accepted the challenge with a YouTube video aimed at raising spirits (and some money) to make sure Obama and the rest of the Democratic ticket loses in 2012. The Center for Responsive Politics had its own rapid response – a fascinating assessment of Obama’s fundraising inside Charlotte and the rest of North Carolina, compared to funds raised by his past and future opponents. No doubt about it: North Carolina will be ground zero for intensive political warfare in 2012, including an unprecedented clash of grassroots activists and historic levels of political spending.
Friday, January 7, 2011
Friday, January 7th, 2011
A new edition of Democracy NC’s brochure featuring quotes and photographs of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is now available. It includes information about the upcoming H K on J assembly in Raleigh, the redistricting process affecting local and state political districts, the controversial proposal to require a photo ID for voting, and Dr. King’s challenge to keep advocating for positive change. It’s ideal for distributing at King Day and Black History Month events and to local churches and community groups in your area. The pocket-size brochures are provided free. (The brochure folds in half, so part that you view is upside down!) If you want a supply, please send an email with your STREET address for UPS shipment, the quantity you desire, and a phone number in case there is a problem with delivery. Send the info to sprc@mindspring.com.
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Tuesday, December 7th, 2010
Following up yesterday’s post about the NC Republican’s quest to ban certain citizens from voting, here’s a marvelous account from the Institute for Southern Studies that unpacks the disturbing parallels between the Democrats’ anti-black, anti-poor Jim Crow laws of the early 20th Century and the Republicans’ voter suppression campaign of the early 21st Century. Highly recommended reading! (You may want to subscribe to the ISS’s Facing South blog while you’re on the site. Democracy NC is a spin off of a project that spun off from ISS about 15 years ago.)
Friday, December 3, 2010
Friday, December 3rd, 2010
Who voted in the 2010 election in North Carolina? A county-by-county profile of who voted – by race, sex, age and party – shows that turnout among registered Republicans in North Carolina increased by 11 percentage points over 2006, the last mid-term election, but by only 5 points for Democrats. But the Democrats can’t blame their black supporters for this weak performance: turnout among African-American voters increased by 11 percentage points over 2006, compared to a 7 point gain for all white voters. Read the Democracy North Carolina overview and the four pages of details for the 81 counties that have so far reported the demographic details of their voters.
Friday, November 5, 2010
Friday, November 5th, 2010
The Institute for Southern Studies has another report on Art Pope’s use of corporate and personal donations to spread lies and depress voter turnout by pumping up the “negatives” of state Democratic candidates. This is how you purchase election outcomes through deceit, but of course it didn’t begin with this election cycle and is not uniquely a Republican strategy. However, the scope of damage a few billionaires can inflict on democracy has dramatically grown with Citizens United and new technologies. Along these lines, NBC News has a report exposing another group bankrolling Karl Rove’s comeback – the Wall Street greed heads who steered the economy into the ditch. These are the patriots protecting America’s culture of family values.
