A person’s voter registration should remain valid when he or she moves within the state.
Centralized statewide voter registration databases are essential to provide portable registration.
Permanent and Portable registration helps narrow participation gaps among young people, people of color and lower-income Americans.
Twelve percent of Americans change their residence every year.1 Between 2011 and 2012, 22 million voting-age Americans moved either within the same county or to a different county within thei
Eligible 16 and 17 year olds should be pre-registered to vote and automatically added to voting rolls when they turn 18.
Targeted outreach to young eligible voters leads to substantial increases in voter registration.
Encouraging civic engagement at a young age leads to increased participation over a lifetime.
In the 2008 election, young people voted at the second-highest rate of all time.1 Voter turnout among 18-24 year olds grew by double digits from 2000 to 2008.
Third party voter registration drives are a critical component to ensuring eligible voters are registered.
States should permit third party registration drives without restrictive limitations.
Boards of elections should provide materials on voter registration to registration drives.
The National Voter Registration Act substantially increased the number of places where eligible voters could register. Now, voter registration is available at motor vehicle offices, public assistance agencies, and various other sites.
Early voting allows eligible voters more time to review issues and cast their ballot.
Early voting can increase voter participation.
States should expand early in-person voting locations and adopt no-excuse permanent absentee voting.
In a representative democracy like ours, the more people that vote, the stronger our democracy becomes. Given this truth, our voting procedures should provide the flexibility to accommodate every eligible person who wants to cast a ballot.
States should provide uniform poll worker training before Election Day to ensure Election Day runs smoothly.
Polls workers should receive a uniform wage across the state.
Poll worker recruitment should target public employees and high school and college students.
The formula for a well-run polling place is not complicated. At the heart of it, a sufficient number of properly trained poll workers is necessary to smoothly run an election process.
Ballot design should be simple and straightforward to ensure voters understand for whom and for what they are casting their votes.
Ballots should be written in clear, plain language.
Ballot design should focus on the ABCs: Accuracy, Brevity and Clarity.
It seems almost too basic to have to state that the ballots used for voting must be simple and straightforward. Yet, past experience has shown that ballot confusion is common and can have disastrous consequences.
Overly burdensome photo ID laws add an unnecessary layer of bureaucracy that disenfranchises millions of otherwise eligible voters.
Photo ID requirements place tremendous fiscal burdens on states and localities.
States should look to their constitutions to protect the freedom to vote from onerous ID laws.
Restrictive photo ID laws for voting are a level of unnecessary red tape and bureaucracy that hinder the freedom to vote. Strict laws that require narrow types of government-issued ID go above and beyond normal registration requirements.
Provisional ballots are not counted as regular ballots and should be used in only very limited situations.
Provisional ballots cast solely because an eligible voter voted in the wrong precinct or polling place should be counted as a regular ballot for any office for which the voter was eligible to vote.
Adopting Same Day Registration would substantially decrease the need for provisional ballots because eligible voters can simply re-register if there are registration issues.
The scenario occurs regularly on Election Day: a voter will show up at t
Nearly six million people are denied the right to vote due to felony offenses, even if they have completed their sentences.
One out of every 13 eligible African Americans of voting age has lost their right to vote.
States should not permanently take away the freedom to vote from any citizen. At a bare minimum, the right to vote should be automatically restored once a person is released from incarceration.
Prohibiting citizens from voting defies our democracy’s principle of one person, one vote.
States should ensure eligible voters can be added to state registration databases with fair, effective and uniform standards, and should only remove voters in compliance with the National Voter Registration Act and other applicable laws.
Only election officials should be able to challenge the eligibility of a voter.
When a voter is challenged, the burden of proof should fall on the challenger with a specific and timely adjudication process.
Eligible Americans should not have to overcome burdensome barriers to cast their ballots.
Making our election system function for all of our citizens should be a bedrock commitment of our nation. The current disparities by class and race in voter registration—and thus, voter turnout—undermine an essential tenet of our democracy: of, by and for the people. In order to address the current inefficiencies and inadequacies in our election procedures, we have outlined a robust set of policy recommendations and best practices.
Election administration should not be affected by partisan goals.
Partisan election administration increases the risk of disenfranchisement.
Non-partisan election administration boosts faith and confidence in the electoral process and promotes fair and accurate electoral results.
If anything should be free from politics or partisan fighting, it should be our election administration. Regardless of political ideology, everyone can agree that our elections should be conducted in a non-partisan and transparent manner.
16 policies and practices that would make registration more accessible and seamless, lead to more effective and efficient election administration, and strengthen protections for voters’ rights.
The NVRA was intended to make voter registration widely available at agencies serving the public, and is an important tool for modernizing voter registration. Ensuring compliance with NVRA requirements increases voter registration rates, particularly among low-income populations. Expanding the number of designated NVRA agencies can further expand the reach of voter registration opportunities. Congress enacted the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) in 1993 with the goal of making voter registration more convenient and accessible.
ALBANY—Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman today announced new legislation to restore accountability and ensure access to the ballot box by eliminating baseless and intimidating challenges to voter eligibility at the polls on Election Day. Under current law, voters who are challenged at the polls are required to recite an oath affirming their right to vote. The challenger, on the other hand, has no such obligation.
