Democracy Program

Voter Identification: A Threat to Election Integrity

All contemporary evidence suggests that individual voter fraud is rare and that the source of voters' election concerns lie elsewhere. Nevertheless, calls for stringent new voter identification requirements to guard against phantom fraud claims are on the rise. In 2005, three state legislatures adopted restrictive new voter identification mandates like government-issued photo ID and proof of citizenship requirements. Since the 2004-05 session, at least 20 other state legislatures considered similar measures. In addition, the Carter-Baker Commission on Federal Election Reform recommended that REAL ID be a prerequisite to voting. These new voter ID proposals will create new burdens for poll workers, prevent eligible Americans from voting, and prove useless to remedy some of the real problems witnessed in recent elections.

Fact: Voter fraud at the polls is minimal and unlikely to change election outcomes.

• In Securing the Vote: An Analysis of Election Fraud (2003) Barnard College Professor Lori Minnite, found that voter fraud is rare, that safeguards to prevent fraud are already in place, and that individual voter fraud rarely sways election results.[1]
  
  
• Implementation of restrictive polling place ID requirements creates added burdens for already harried poll workers, for miniscule gain. Data from the U.S. Department of Justice shows that while 196,139,871 votes have been cast in federal elections since October 2002, only 52 individuals have been convicted of federal voter fraud. Most of these convictions were for vote buying or for voter registration fraud, neither of which would be prevented by restrictive ID requirements at the polls. [2]
  
  
• The Coalition on Homelessness & Housing in Ohio and the League of Women Voters Coalition found that, while more than 9,078,728 votes were cast in Ohio during the 2002 and 2004 elections, there were only four instances of ineligible people voting or attempting to vote in the state--approximately 0.00000044 percent of the total number of votes cast.[3]
  
  
• A far-ranging federal probe into allegations of fraud in Wisconsin uncovered no evidence of a conspiracy to influence the 2004 presidential election. U.S. Attorney Steve Biskupic's investigation resulted in charges against 10 formerly incarcerated individuals for voting illegally and against four others for voting twice.  Of those four, three cases have been dispensed with without conviction; the forth prosecution is still court pending. By way of comparison, 2,997,007 votes were cast statewide in Wisconsin in 2004.[4]

Fact: Restrictive voter ID mandates do not address the concerns raised by proponents.

• Restrictive ID requirements may plausibly prevent fraudulent voting by individuals using false names, but these cases are extremely rare.  Individuals who registered under fictitious names during the 2004 election--such as Mary Poppins and Dick Tracy--did not cast ballots and were caught by election officials prior to Election Day.
  
  
• Unscrupulous partisans do try to sway the results of high-stakes elections--through organized voter intimidation and vote suppression campaigns. These tried-and-true conspiracies can prevent thousands of votes from being cast. Individual voter fraud is by comparison not only rare, but a high-cost/low-gain gamble. While the odd fraudulent voter risks detection by trained election officials, imprisonment and/or stiff fines, his sole vote is extremely unlikely to alter the outcome of any election.
  
  
• Stringent polling place ID requirements will not prevent vote-buying schemes, ballot tampering, voting by disfranchised felons or ineligible non-citizens, voting in multiple locations, or the abuse of absentee voting provisions.

Fact: Restrictive ID requirements risk disfranchising millions of Americans.

• The American Association of People with Disabilities estimates that more than 3 million Americans with disabilities do not possess a driver's license or state-issued photo ID.[5]
  
  
• A University of Milwaukee study has found that approximately 23 percent of Wisconsin residents aged 65 and older do not have driver's licenses or photo identification, while fewer than 3 percent of Wisconsin students have driver's licenses showing their current address. The study also revealed that less than half of African-American and Hispanic adults (47 percent and 43 percent respectively) living in Milwaukee County have valid driver's licenses.[6]
  
  
• AARP of Georgia estimates that about 153,000 Georgia seniors who voted in 2004 do not possess a government-issued photo ID.[7] These Georgians could not have voted had the 2005 ID law been in effect.
  
  
• The 2001 Commission on Federal Election Reform estimated that 6 to 10 percent of voting-age Americans do not have a driver's license or state-issued photo ID--as many as 20 million eligible voters. The same report found that those who lack photo ID are disproportionately poor and urban.[8]
  
  
• In 1994, the U.S. Department of Justice found that African Americans living in Louisiana were four to five times less likely to have government-issued photo ID than whites. [9] These numbers are likely to have grown in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. A large percentage of those victimized by the storm have lost birth certificates, social security cards and all other government-issued documentation.

Fact: Proof of citizenship requirements shut citizens out of the electoral process.

• The most noticeable effect of Arizona's Proposition 200--intended in part to prevent undocumented residents from voting--has been to prevent U.S. citizens from registering to vote. In the first six months of 2005, more than 5,000 Arizona citizens had their voter registrations rejected for failing to provide adequate proof of citizenship.[10]
  
  
• In addition, one in 10 Arizona motorists--or more than 400,000 people--have valid driver's licenses issued before the cut-off date specified by the new law. If these citizens want to vote, then they must pay for a new ID.[11]

Fact: Restrictive voter ID requirements threaten election integrity.

• An election with integrity is one that is open to every eligible voter. Restrictive voter ID requirements degrade the integrity of our elections by systematically excluding large numbers of eligible Americans. Restrictive ID requirements should have no place in our democracy.

[1] Lorraine Minnite and David Callahan, Securing the Vote: An Analysis of Election Fraud (2003) http://www.demos.org/pubs/EDR - Securing the Vote.pdf. [2] Office of the Clerk, U.S. House of Representatives, Election Statistics (2005), http://clerk.house.gov/members/electionInfo/elections.html. [3] Coalition on Homelessness & Housing in Ohio & League of Women Voters Coalition, Let the People Vote (2005), http://www.cohhio.org/alerts/Election%20Reform%20Report.pdf. [4] Steve Schultze, No Vote Fraud Plot Found, MILWAUKEE JOURNAL-SENTINEL, Dec. 5, 2005.[5] American Association of People with Disabilities et al, Statement in Opposition to a National Voter Identification Card, June 29, 2005. [6] John Pawasarat, The Driver License Status of the Voting Age Population in Wisconsin, at 1, 11 (June 2005), http://www.uwm.edu/Dept/ETI/barriers/DriversLicense.pdf. [7] States Debate Photo ID at the Polls, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS, Mar. 31, 2005. [8] John Mark Hansen, Coordinator, Task Force on the Federal Election System, Report, at VI-4 in Task Force Reports to Accompany the Report of the National Commission on Election Reform (Aug. 2001); National Commission on Election Reform, To Assure Pride and Confidence in the Electoral Process, at 32 (Aug. 2001). [9] Letter from Deval L. Patrick, Assistant Att.y Gen., Civil Rights Div., U.S. Department of Justice, to Sheri Marcus Morris, La. Assistant Att.y Gen. (Nov. 21, 1994). [10] Elvia Díaz and Robbie Sherwood, Prop. 200.s Effect Minimal, ARIZONA REPUBLIC, Jun. 5, 2005. [11] Pat Flannery, New Rules Snag Voters with Older Driver's Licenses, ARIZONA REPUBLIC, Nov. 26, 2005.