Natural State News

Election security measures in Arkansas and other states that verify voters are who they say they are would be “outlawed” under the H.R.1 legislation that Democrats are pushing in U.S. Congress, says former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli.

Arkansas law requires verification of absentee ballots with a copy of a valid ID, but that would be displaced by provisions in H.R. 1, approved by the House in March and awaiting a decision in the Senate.

“Today most states have a variety of security steps to protect their elections, such as requiring voters to show a picture I.D. or list their driver’s license number on mail-in ballots,” Cuccinelli, a Republican, wrote in RealClearPolitics. “However, in parts of H.R. 1 … many of these current security practices are outlawed. You read that right – outlawed.

“It is apparently irrelevant to the drafters of H.R. 1 that every category of Americans supports voter I.D. to secure elections, including Democrats, blacks and Hispanics,” he added.

Arkansas will be required to resort to a signature verification process on absentee ballots, if the state adopted a verification process at all – not required under H.R. 1.

Moreover, the signature verification process under the federal legislation will be a highly partisan one, Cuccinelli argues.

 “H.R. 1 puts forth a new standard," he wrote. "In order to reject a ballot based on an unverifiable or incorrect signature, both judges would have to agree that the signature on the ballot is questionable. Since the standard operating procedure in most localities is that two judges be present, H.R. 1 essentially states that the authorization of only one judge is needed to approve signatures, regardless of how they compare with the signatures on file.

He continued: ''This failure of election mechanics opens the door to a partisan veto built into the process. H.R. 1 would devastate the effectiveness of signature verification, as regardless of any issues with signatures – no matter how clear or evident – either party could choose to verify any amount of dubious signatures.”

Voter-identification laws were recommended by the 2005 Commission on Election Reform, chaired by former President Jimmy Carter, a Democrat, and James Baker, secretary of state under Republican President George H. W. Bush.