    [House Hearing, 116 Congress]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

               VOTING RIGHTS AND ELECTION ADMINISTRATION IN AMERICA

    =======================================================================

                                    HEARING

                                   before the

                           SUBCOMMITTEE ON ELECTIONS

                             SUBCOMMITTEE ON HOUSE

                                 ADMINISTRATION

                            HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                         ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS

                                 FIRST SESSION

                                   ----------

                                OCTOBER 17, 2019

                                   ----------

          Printed for the use of the Committee on House Administration

                  [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

                           Available on the Internet:

             https://govinfo.gov/committee/house-administration

                                   ______

                      U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE

    38-145                     WASHINGTON: 2019

                                C O N T E N T S

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                                OCTOBER 17, 2019

                                                                       Page
    Voting Rights and Election Administration in America.............     1

                               OPENING STATEMENTS

    Chairwoman Marcia L. Fudge.......................................     1
        Prepared statement of Chairwoman Fudge.......................     4
    Hon. Rodney Davis, Ranking Member................................     6
        Prepared statement of Ranking Member Davis...................     8
    Chairwoman Zoe Lofgren...........................................    11
        Prepared statement Chairperson Lofgren.......................    12

                                   WITNESSES

    Kristen Clarke, President and Executive Director, Lawyers'
      Committee for Civil Rights Under Law...........................    13
        Prepared statement of Ms. Clarke.............................    15
    Dale Ho, Director, Voting Rights Project.........................    28
        Prepared statement of Mr. Ho.................................    30
    Deuel Ross, Senior Counsel, NAACP Legal Defense Fund.............    47
        Prepared statement of Mr. Ross...............................    49
    Hon. Catherine E. Lhamon, Chair, U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.    66
        Prepared statement of Hon. Lhamon............................    69
    Brenda Wright, Senior Advisor for Legal Strategies, Demos........    76
        Prepared statement of Ms. Wright.............................    78
    Michael Waldman, President, Brennan Center for Justice...........    89
        Prepared statement of Mr. Waldman............................    91
    Elena Nunez, Director of State Operations and Ballot Measure
      Strategies, Common Cause.......................................   101
        Prepared statement of Ms. Nunez..............................   103
    Hannah Fried, Director, All Voting Is Local......................   120
        Prepared statement of Ms. Fried..............................   123
    Virginia Kase, Chief Executive Officer, League of Women Voters...   138
        Prepared statement of Ms. Kase...............................   140
    Barbara Arnwine, National Co-Chair, National Commission for Voter
      Justice........................................................   144
        Prepared statement of Ms. Arnwine............................   146
    Denise Lieberman, Senior Attorney and Program Director, Power and
      Democracy, Advancement Project.................................   150
        Prepared statement of Ms. Lieberman..........................   152
    John C. Yang, President and Executive Director, Asian Americans
      Advancing Justice..............................................   164
        Prepared statement of Mr. Yang...............................   167
    Arturo Vargas, Chief Executive Officer, NALEO Educational Fund...   182
        Prepared statement of Mr. Vargas.............................   184
    Thomas Saenz, President and General Counsel, MALDEF..............   201
        Prepared statement of Mr. Saenz..............................   203
    Michelle Bishop, Voting Rights Specialist, National Disability
      Rights Network.................................................   208
        Prepared statement of Ms. Bishop.............................   210

                           SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD

    Brennan Center for Justice, Purges: A Growing Threat to the Right
      to Vote........................................................   222
    Brennan Center for Justice, Voter Purge Rates Remain High,
      Analysis Finds August 1, 2019..................................   255
    Leadership Conference Education Fund, Democracy Diverted: Polling
      Place Closures and the Right to Vote September 2019............   261
    NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Analysis of Barriers to
      Voting in the 2018 Midterm Elections...........................   343
    Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, Sr., Founder and President, Rainbow
      PUSH Coalition, statement......................................   383
    Rhode Island Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil
      Rights, Advisory Memorandum on Voting Rights Briefing..........   388
    North Dakota Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil
      Rights, Concern for Potential voter Suppression October 26,
      2018...........................................................   394
    Alaska Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights,
      Alaska Native Voting Rights....................................   396
    Louisiana Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil
      Rights, Barriers to Voting in Louisiana........................   464
    Illinois Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil
      Rights, Civil Rights and Voting in Illinois....................   503
    California Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil
      Rights, Voting Integrity in California.........................   712
    Kansas Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights,
      Voting Rights and the Kansas Secure and Fair Elections Act.....   771
    New Hampshire Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil
      Rights, Voting Rights in New Hampshire.........................   848
    Indiana Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil
      Rights, Voting Rights in Indiana...............................   877
    Texas Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights,
      Voting Rights in Texas.........................................   893
    Transformative Justice Coalition, 61 Forms of Voter Suppression..   916
    Racial Equity Anchors Collaborative, We Vote, We Count: The Need
      for Congressional Action to Secure the Right to Vote for All
      Citizens.......................................................   920

              VOTING RIGHTS AND ELECTION ADMINISTRATION IN AMERICA

                                  ----------

                           THURSDAY, OCTOBER 17, 2019

                      House of Representatives,
                             Subcommittee on Elections,
                             Committee on House Administration,
                                                        Washington, DC.
        The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:00 a.m., in
    Room 1310, Longworth House Office Building, Hon. Marcia L.
    Fudge [chair of the Subcommittee] presiding.
        Present: Representatives Fudge, Aguilar, Davis of Illinois,
    and Lofgren.
        Staff Present: Sean Jones, Legislative Clerk; David Tucker,
    Senior Counsel and Parliamentarian; Sarah Nasta, Elections
    Counsel; Peter Whippy, Communications Director; Veleter Mazyck,
    Chief of Staff, Office of Representative Fudge; Evan Dorner,
    Office of Representative Aguilar; Courtney Parella, Minority
    Communications Director; Cole Felder, Minority General Counsel;
    Jesse Roberts, Minority Counsel; Jen Daulby, Minority Staff
    Director; Tim Monahan, Minority Oversight Director; and Carson
    Steelman, Minority Professional Staff.
        Chairwoman Fudge. If our witnesses could come to the table,
    please.
        Good morning. The Subcommittee on Elections of the
    Committee of House Administration will come to order.
        I would like to thank the Members of the Committee as well
    as our witnesses and those in the audience for being here
    today.
        I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative
    days to revise and extend their remarks and that any written
    statements be made part of the record.
        Hearing no objection, so ordered.
        We are here today to examine the state of voting rights and
    election administration in America. The right to vote is
    sacred, and as Members of Congress, we take our responsibility
    to protect access to the ballot very seriously.
        This Subcommittee, and our Committee as a whole, is charged
    with overseeing the administration of Federal elections. This
    country has a long history of failing to ensure equal and
    unencumbered access to the ballot for all her citizens. And
    while States and localities have a significant role in carrying
    out elections, Congress cannot abdicate its critical
    responsibility to ensure every eligible American can access the
    ballot box, cast a ballot free from discrimination and
    suppression, and has a steadfast faith in our democratic
    process that their ballot will be counted as cast.
        Since the beginning of the 116th Congress, this
    Subcommittee has been holding field hearings across the
    country, convening forums to hear from voting and election
    advocates, experts, community leaders, litigators, and voters
    about the state of voting rights and election administration in
    their communities.
        We have been listening closely and collecting testimony and
    evidence regarding the wide range of methods of voter
    suppression and discrimination being deployed across the
    Nation. Throughout our hearings in Brownsville, Texas; Atlanta,
    Georgia; Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, North Dakota;
    Halifax, North Carolina; Cleveland, Ohio; Ft. Lauderdale,
    Florida; Birmingham, Alabama; and Phoenix, Arizona, the
    Subcommittee has heard testimony on barriers new and old.
        We have heard testimony about how polling place closures,
    consolidations, and movements cause confusion for voters and
    lead to long lines and wait times that are unacceptable for the
    integrity of our democracy; how restrictions and cutbacks to
    early voting disenfranchises voters, especially those with
    limited transportation options or inflexible work hours; strict
    voter ID requirements that can be overly burdensome on the poor
    and minority voters and create a modern day poll tax.
        Discriminatory voter-purge practices can disproportionately
    impact otherwise eligible minority voters. Denying the right to
    vote to nearly 6 million formerly incarcerated individuals
    fundamentally undermines our democracy and continues to deny
    citizens their constitutional right. How Native American
    communities have faced more than 200 years of discrimination,
    disenfranchisement, and voter suppression, which continues to
    this day, and is exacerbated when Tribes are not consulted when
    States and the Federal Government craft voting laws.
        The lack of adequate access to properly translated
    materials and language assistance at the polls disenfranchises
    protected voters. And how litigation under Section 2 of the
    Voting Rights Act, remains a critical tool for protecting the
    franchise but is not an adequate remedy to enforce such a
    fundamental right.
        Today's hearing will expand upon these issues, providing us
    with a national scope and stories from States the Subcommittee
    has yet to visit. We will hear from experts, advocates,
    litigators, and leaders who have worked for years to ensure
    every American can exercise his or her right to vote. Your
    testimony will help guide us as this Committee seeks to
    understand what needs to be done to safeguard our elections and
    guarantee access to the ballot box.
        Nearly 6 years after the Supreme Court decided Shelby
    County v. Holder, we are doing this work because voter
    suppression and discrimination still exists. It is our duty as
    elected Members of Congress to uphold and defend the
    Constitution and protect the rights of the voter. Chief Justice
    Roberts himself said, ``voting discrimination still exists, no
    one doubts that.'' It is critical Congress continuously examine
    the state of voting in America and build a true contemporaneous
    record of ongoing discrimination and barriers to voting. That
    is why we are here today.
        America is great because of her ability to repair her
    faults. It is time for us to set the right example as a
    democracy and encourage people to vote, rather than continuing
    to erect barriers that seek to suppress the vote and the voices
    of our communities. There is much work to be done.
        I will now yield to the Ranking Member, Mr. Davis of
    Illinois, for your opening statement.
        [The statement of Chairwoman Fudge follows:]

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.
        The Committee on House Administration has the extremely
    important task to conduct oversight of Federal elections.
    Throughout the Committee's existence, Republicans and Democrats
    have worked across the aisle to create significant election
    policy that widely impacted this Nation, including legislation
    to eliminate the poll tax, legislation to create easier access
    to members of the military and their families when voting
    overseas, and the Help America Vote Act of 2002, a landmark
    piece of legislation that took substantial steps to remedy the
    problems seen during the 2000 Presidential election.
        The Subcommittee on Elections was created for the primary
    purpose to be an extension of House Administration to enhance
    the Committee's oversight capabilities of Federal elections and
    how these elections are administered. Chairwoman Fudge has been
    leading our Subcommittee with the intention to investigate
    voting rights issues in order to create a new formula that will
    reauthorize Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act. And I have been
    proud to travel to a few of the stops that this Election
    Subcommittee has participated in throughout the Nation, and it
    has been an educational experience each and every time and a
    great opportunity for, I think, everyone to see how we here on
    this side of the dais can work together to get things done.
        So thank you, Madam Chairwoman, for your diligence, and
    thank you for your willingness to talk about these issues, not
    just here in Washington, D.C.
        The Voting Rights Act, enacted in 1965, for the purpose of
    removing racial-based restrictions on voting, has historically
    been a bipartisan effort. This legislation was most recently
    authorized under a Republican President and a Republican
    Congress. In 2013, the Supreme Court determined Section 4 of
    the VRA to be unconstitutional, in Shelby County v. Holder.
    Chief Justice Roberts said the Voting Rights Act of 1965
    employed extraordinary measures to address an extraordinary
    problem.
        While the Court did not weigh in on whether there still is
    an extraordinary problem the Supreme Court did hold that what
    made sense at one time may have lost its relevance. They noted
    that nearly 50 years later, things have changed dramatically.
        VRA primarily remains under the jurisdiction of the House
    Judiciary Committee, but the House Administration Committee has
    an obligation to review how elections are administered and
    recognize if any issue should elevate from a State to a Federal
    level, which is what we all hope to do here today.
        This Subcommittee, as I said, has held--as Madam Chairwoman
    has said and I alluded to, has held seven field hearings and
    one listening session across the country in an effort to reveal
    widespread voter discrimination. Though the Subcommittee has
    yet to find a single citizen who wanted to vote but was unable
    to cast a vote, we still have a duty to the American people to
    protect and defend everyone's right to vote. As I have said
    many times since coming into my role as the Ranking Member of
    the House Administration Committee, and the lone member of the
    Election Subcommittee on our side of the aisle, the greatest
    threat to our election system is partisanship in the
    administering of elections.
        If there is clear evidence of intentional widespread voter
    discrimination, Congress should take steps to remedy that in a
    bipartisan manner. We must commit to diligently review the
    facts and the numbers carefully, as well as hear from all
    relevant stakeholders. We should take time to examine the voter
    registration trends and the voter turnout trends. It is
    essential that Congress make well-informed decisions and
    understand our role in assisting States, while not overpowering
    them.
        Voting is a fundamental right for every single American
    citizen, and protecting that right is a responsibility that I
    and everyone I serve with on my side of the aisle and the other
    side of the aisle take very seriously.
        Today, I am here to listen and learn more from our
    witnesses about voting rights and election administration. I
    look forward to hearing from all of you who have agreed to
    share their testimony with all of us this morning.
        And thank you, Madam Chairwoman. I yield back.
        [The statement of Mr. Davis of Illinois follows:]

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        I thank my friend, the Ranking Member, for participating
    and really understanding that our goal as a Congress is to get
    to the truth. So I appreciate that and I thank you.
        Now I will introduce our panel, but as I prepare to do
    that, let me go through some housekeeping matters. Each of you
    will be recognized for 5 minutes. I will remind our witnesses
    that their entire written statements will be made part of the
    record and that the record will remain open for at least five
    days for additional materials to be submitted. The lighting
    system which you have in front of you will tell you how much
    time you have remaining. You will have five minutes. Yellow
    means you have one minute left. Red means please wrap up your
    statement.
        Our first panel, we will hear from Kristen Clarke--
    welcome--is President and Executive Director of the Lawyers'
    Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. The Lawyers' Committee
    seeks to promote fair housing and community development,
    economic justice, voting rights, equal educational opportunity,
    criminal justice reform--criminal justice, judicial diversity
    and more. Ms. Clarke previously served as the head of the Civil
    Rights Bureau for the New York State Attorney General's Office,
    and has spent several years at the NAACP Legal Defense and
    Educational Fund, and worked at the U.S. Department of Justice
    in the Civil Rights Division.
        Welcome.
        Dale Ho is the Director of the ACLU's Voting Rights Project
    and supervise--it is one of them days. It is been a tough day.
    Dale Ho is the Director of the ACLU's Voting Rights Project and
    supervisors--this is because it is written wrong--and
    supervised the ACLU's voting rights litigation and advocacy
    work nationwide. Mr. Ho has active cases in over a dozen States
    throughout the country and is also an adjunct professor of law
    at NYU School of Law. Prior to joining the ACLU, Dale was
    Assistant Counsel at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, an associate
    at--Fried?
        Mr. Ho. Fried.
        Chairwoman Fudge [continuing]. Fried, Frank, Harris,
    Shriver, & Jacobson, LLP, and a judicial law clerk.
        Thank you, sir. Welcome.
        Deuel Ross--did I get it right?
        Mr. Ross. Deuel.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Deuel?
        Mr. Ross. Yes.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Deuel Ross serves as Senior Counsel at
    the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. In that capacity,
    Mr. Ross uses litigation, public education, and other advocacy
    strategies to ensure that Black people have equal access to the
    political process and to educational opportunities. Among his
    ongoing cases, Mr. Ross is lead counsel in Greater Birmingham
    Ministries v. Merrill, an ongoing Voting Rights Act lawsuit
    that challenges Alabama's racially discriminatory voter ID law.
    He was a member of the trial team that has coauthored the
    appellate briefs in Veasey v. Perry, the successful challenge
    to Texas' unconstitutional voter ID law. Mr. Ross is also an
    Adjunct Professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School
    where he teaches a seminar course on the Voting Rights Act.
        Welcome all.
        And we have been joined by the Chairperson of the
    Committee, the whole Committee, Ms. Lofgren.
        The Chairperson. Well, thank you very much.
        You know, this Committee is charged with overseeing the
    administration of Federal elections, and in recognition of that
    responsibility, we established the Subcommittee on Elections.
    This Subcommittee has been led by its outstanding Chairwoman,
    Marcia Fudge. They have held eight hearings throughout the
    country, giving voice to many not generally heard in
    Washington, D.C., and convening this hearing today.
        You know, too many Americans view themselves as shut out of
    our representative system, and others can't participate because
    of election administration procedures that fail to consider how
    Americans live and work in the 21st century. Some of these
    barriers to participation make it harder for certain
    populations, including communities of color and other
    underrepresented groups, to vote. And this is especially the
    case after the Supreme Court gutted core provisions of the
    Voting Rights Act in Shelby County v. Holder.
        Additionally, we know now that foreign agents, specifically
    the Russians, attempted to interfere in American elections in
    2016. And as we discussed yesterday in the full Committee
    hearing, no single group has been targeted more with
    disinformation than African Americans. That is a voter
    suppression tactic.
        So we do know that, for years, the House has failed to
    adequately protect the right to vote. The House allowed
    discriminatory, suppressive laws to be enacted throughout the
    country, laws so discriminatory they targeted African
    Americans--and this is from a court case--with surgical
    precision.
        The work of the Subcommittee on Elections is critical to
    achieving the principle that every American has the right to
    vote, the right free from discrimination and from
    administrative barriers so cumbersome that they actually
    suppress the vote. We know it is time for Congress to act to
    ensure equal access to the ballot for every American.
        I look forward to the testimony today. And once again, I
    just want to thank the Chairwoman and the others on the
    Election Subcommittee who have worked so very hard to gather
    information throughout the United States for their outstanding
    work that serves our country so well.
        And with that, I yield back.
        [The statement of Chairperson Lofgren follows:]

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        And thank you for your support, Madam Chairperson. We could
    not have made these field hearings work without you. So we
    appreciate it.
        Ms. Clarke, you are now recognized for 5 minutes.

    STATEMENTS OF KRISTEN CLARKE, PRESIDENT AND EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR,
        LAWYERS' COMMITTEE FOR CIVIL RIGHTS UNDER LAW; DALE HO,
        DIRECTOR, VOTING RIGHTS PROJECT; AND DEUEL ROSS, SENIOR
                   COUNSEL, NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE FUND

                      STATEMENT OF KRISTEN CLARKE

        Ms. Clarke. Chairwoman Fudge, Ranking Member Davis, and
    Members of the Subcommittee on Elections, my name is Kristen
    Clarke, and I serve as the President and Executive Director of
    the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. Thank you
    for the opportunity to testify today on issues that are
    consequential to the fate of American democracy.
        The Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law has been
    at the forefront of our Nation's battle for equal rights since
    it was created in 1963 at the request of President Kennedy to
    enlist the private bar in the fight to combat racial
    discrimination. Our work to safeguard voting rights and to
    fight voter suppression has been central to this mission. The
    Lawyers' Committee has been a leader in many of the core voting
    rights cases over the last several decades and stands at the
    forefront of current efforts to ensure that our laws safeguard,
    not restrict, access to the franchise. The Lawyers' Committee
    also leads Election Protection, the Nation's largest and
    longest running, nonpartisan voter protection program.
        In Shelby County v. Holder, Chief Justice Roberts observed
    that ``things have changed dramatically,'' in the South since
    passage of the Voting Rights Act, and that ``blatantly
    discriminatory evasions of Federal decrees are rare.'' Our
    experience and the record shows that this proclamation was not
    true in 2013 and remains untrue today. Modern-day voter
    suppression efforts are proliferating. Moreover, the Shelby
    decision opened the floodgates to discrimination and voter
    suppression. There is no doubt our Nation is currently in a
    period of retrenchment concerning access to the franchise.
        Since Shelby, the Lawyers' Committee has been involved in
    41 cases relating to discriminatory voting practices or
    policies that have had an adverse effect on the rights of
    African Americans and other minority voters. These instances
    are summarized in my written testimony.
        Twenty-four of these actions were filed since January 20,
    2017. Sadly, DOJ has filed no such cases during this timeframe.
    While we have achieved substantial success in about three-
    quarters of these 24 cases, this is just the tip of the iceberg
    of potential voting rights violations that could be challenged
    by DOJ, were they actively enforcing the law in a restored
    Section 5.
        Without the prophylactic protections of Section 5, and
    given that parts of our country are becoming more racially
    diverse, we have seen voter suppression efforts intensify.
    Examples of the ways in which officials are working to
    undermine minority voting rights are outlined in my testimony
    and include barriers to voter registration; draconian
    requirements imposed on groups that are working to register
    people to vote; purge programs; restrictive mandatory photo ID
    laws; polling place closures, polling places moved to hostile
    locations like police departments; ineffective language
    assistance for LEP voters; long lines at polling sites due to
    staffing or machine issues; mass rejection of absentee ballots;
    faulty technology that risks votes not properly counted and
    systems subject to hacking; cuts on early voting opportunities,
    vote dilution, and racially gerrymandered maps.
        Case-by-case litigation is simply not enough to counter the
    magnitude of this threat. Writing for the dissent in Shelby,
    Justice Ginsburg observed that Congress passed the Voting
    Rights Act because requiring private individuals and civil
    rights groups to litigate every threat to voting rights was
    ineffective and extremely expensive, like battling the Hydra,
    the multiheaded monster in Greek mythology. These cases are
    costly, time-intensive, long and protracted, and for every case
    that we file, Americans have to wait months and sometimes years
    for a resolution to protect their right to vote. This is not
    sustainable.
        Even when courts strike a discriminatory law or practice,
    officials often resort to a slightly different practice,
    thrusting communities into a game of whack-a-mole. There is no
    better example of this than Georgia, where officials resurrect
    discriminatory practices repeatedly. In the post-Shelby era,
    local and State officials act with impunity when it comes to
    suppressing the rights of minority voters. Along with
    officials, we sued Georgia three times to stop its exact-match
    practice in voter registration.
        The record makes clear that Congress must restore the full
    protections of the Voting Rights Act. I urge this Committee and
    this Congress to carefully study the record amassed during the
    extensive hearings and field work and to fulfill the promise of
    our Constitution and restore protections needed to ensure that
    African Americans, Latinos, and other people of color enjoy
    equal voice in our democracy.
        Thank you.
        [The statement of Ms. Clarke follows:]

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Mr. Ho, you are now recognized for 5 minutes.

                          STATEMENT OF DALE HO

        Mr. Ho. Chairwoman Fudge, Ranking Member Davis, and Members
    of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify. My
    name is Dale Ho, and I am the Director of the ACLU Voting
    Rights Project. My testimony today will focus on restrictions
    on voting based on false or exaggerated assertions about
    noncitizens registering to vote.
        Time and again, such claims have evaporated under minimal
    scrutiny. Take Kansas. In 2011, Kansas passed a law requiring
    voter registration applicants to submit a citizenship document,
    like a birth certificate or a passport. It sounds innocuous,
    but the effects were devastating.
        Over three years, more than 30,000 voter registration
    applicants were denied, about 12 percent of all applications
    during that period. One was our client Donna Bucci, who did not
    possess a copy of her birth certificate and couldn't afford
    one. Another was our client Wayne Fish, who was born on a
    decommissioned Air Force Base in Illinois and spent two years
    searching for his birth certificate. Two others were our
    clients Tad Stricker and T.J. Boynton, who actually showed
    their birth certificates at the DMV, which then failed to
    forward them along with their voter registration applications.
    All four were disenfranchised in the 2014 midterms.
        We challenged the law, and at trial, then Kansas Secretary
    of State Kris Kobach claimed that there were more than 18,000
    noncitizens registered to vote in Kansas. But his own expert
    witness at the trial estimated that of the 30,000 people whose
    registration applications were blocked under the law, more than
    99 percent were actually United States citizens. The court
    found that the number of noncitizens on the list was, in fact,
    statistically indistinguishable from zero.
        It took four separate lawsuits to block this law, which we
    did in 2018, but in his zeal to defend it, Kobach engaged in a
    disturbing pattern of evasion and lawlessness. He was
    sanctioned for concealing relevant documents. Kansas taxpayers
    paid a thousand dollar fine for that. The court found that he
    willfully disobeyed a preliminary injunction, and Kansas
    taxpayers paid approximately $26,000 for that. And the court
    found a, quote, pattern of flaunting disclosure and discovery
    rules, and ordered him to take 6 hours of continuing legal
    education.
        There is a similar story in Texas. In January, Texas
    Attorney General Ken Paxton tweeted, in capital letters,
    ``voter fraud alert,'' claiming that almost 100,000 registrants
    in Texas were noncitizens. But that was false. Within a week,
    it came out that many of these voters were naturalized citizens
    who had already confirmed their citizenship. In Harris County
    alone, this translated to about 60 percent of 30,000 voters
    flagged there. And as to the remaining 12,000, an audit of 150
    names chosen at random yielded no noncitizens.
        Civil rights organizations, including MALDEF, the ACLU, and
    the Texas Civil Rights Project, sued to stop Texas from purging
    these voters. The court found that Texas ``created [a] mess,''
    which ``exemplifie[d] the power of the government to strike
    fear and intimidate the least powerful among us.'' The case was
    settled with Texas taxpayers on the hook for $450,000 in costs
    and attorney fees. Texas' Secretary of State David Whitley
    departed from office in disgrace.
        There are similar stories of inaccurate purges in Florida,
    Iowa, and Virginia detailed in my written testimony.
        But the administration now seems intent on repeating these
    mistakes. In a case that I argued in the Supreme Court earlier
    this year, the Court blocked the administration's effort to add
    a citizenship question to the 2020 Census, finding that the
    administration's publicly stated purpose of Voting Rights Act
    enforcement was, quote, contrived. Indeed, the first person to
    suggest adding a citizenship question to the Census was the
    recently deceased Thomas Hofeller, known as the ``Michelangelo
    of gerrymandering,'' who conceived of it as the first step in a
    gerrymandering scheme that would be, in his words,
    ``advantageous to Republicans and non-Hispanic Whites.'' In
    other words, the Administration's actual purpose was not to
    protect voting rights, but the opposite, to dilute the
    political influence of communities of color.
        Despite the Court's ruling, the Administration is still
    planning to produce citizenship data to facilitate
    gerrymandering. The Census Bureau is now asking States for
    driver's license records that include citizenship data. Now,
    leaving aside the illicit discriminatory purpose, there are
    serious questions about the accuracy of such data, as
    demonstrated by the experiences in Texas, Kansas, and other
    States described in my written testimony.
        In some, claims about widespread noncitizen registration
    have been used to justify restrictions that have prevented tens
    of thousands of Americans from voting, have often proved to be
    grossly exaggerated or downright false, and have undermined the
    public's confidence in our elections. That is the opposite of
    election integrity.
        Thank you. I look forward to answering any questions that
    you might have.
        [The statement of Mr. Ho follows:]

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        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Mr. Ross, you are recognized for five minutes.

                        STATEMENT OF DEUEL ROSS

        Mr. Ross. Thank you.
        Good morning, Chairwoman Fudge, Ranking Member Davis, and
    the Committee. My name is Deuel Ross. I am a senior counsel at
    the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, or LDF. Thank you for the
    opportunity to testify about voting rights in the United States
    today.
        Since its founding in 1940 by Thurgood Marshall, LDF has
    led the fight to protect and advance the voting rights for
    Black Americans and others. LDF's efforts, however, have gotten
    much more difficult since 2013 when the U.S. Supreme Court
    decided Shelby County v. Holder. LDF attorneys argued Shelby
    County in the Supreme Court in defense of Section 5 of the
    Voting Rights Act.
        As you know, Section 5 required covered States or
    jurisdictions with histories of discrimination to seek
    preclearance from the U.S. Department of Justice or a D.C.
    Federal court before implementing change related to voting. The
    States had the burden of proving that a change was
    nondiscriminatory. The Supreme Court, however, held that
    Congress had not sufficiently justified the coverage formula
    when it reauthorized the Voting Rights Act in 2006.
        By ending preclearance, however, the Supreme Court let
    States with a consistent record of voting discrimination act
    without any scrutiny. The results have been predictable and
    devastating. Within hours of the decision, Texas revived its
    previously blocked photo ID law. Within days, Alabama announced
    that it would enforce an unprecleared photo ID law. Within
    months, New York declined to hold elections to fill 12
    legislative vacancies, denying representation to 800,000 voters
    of color in New York City.
        Of course, LDF and others have continued to use the U.S.
    Constitution and Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act which apply
    nationwide to challenge discriminatory voting changes, but
    Section 2 in the Constitution placed the burden on voters to
    prove that the changes are discriminatory. For example, in
    2014, LDF won a case in which Fayette County, Georgia, tried to
    change its method of election from single-member districts to
    at-large voting after a black commissioner died and they needed
    to hold special elections. Section 2 was able to block that
    change.
        In 2018, LDF convinced the 11th Circuit to block the
    largely white city of Gardendale, Alabama's intentionally
    discriminatory attempt to secede from the more racially diverse
    Jefferson County School Board. The secession would have
    transferred black voters from the county board, in which those
    black voters had representation, to the Gardendale City Council
    in which Black voters had no representation.
        On the eve of the 2018 election, LDF represented black
    college students in Prairie View, Texas, a place with a long
    history of discrimination, where the county tried to cut on-
    campus early voting. Counting officials responded to LDF's
    lawsuit by adding weekend and evening hours.
        In Florida, voting rights for people with felonies were
    restored in 2018 by a ballot referendum but later--earlier this
    year, excuse me, the Florida legislature responded by
    essentially imposing a poll tax requiring voters who have
    otherwise served their sentence to pay all fines and fees
    before they can register to vote.
        Last week, LDF, the ACLU, and others presented evidence at
    a hearing to try to stop this change before the 2019 elections.
    And in a pending challenge to Alabama's photo ID law, LDF has
    demonstrated that discrimination is not a thing of the past. A
    prominent State senator who supported the voter ID law for 10
    years stated that his purpose was to undermine the black power
    structure in Alabama, and other supporters have been caught on
    tape calling black voters aborigines and plotting their efforts
    to suppress the black vote. Black voters in Alabama were four
    times more likely to have their provisional ballots rejected
    because they lacked photo ID. All these changes would have been
    subjected to Section 5.
        LDF has also continued to use Section 2 of the Voting
    Rights Act to challenge at-large elections. For example, in
    2017, a Federal court ruled that Louisiana had intentionally
    discriminated when it maintained at-large elections in
    Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana.
        Unfortunately, this Voting Rights Act litigation, even when
    successful, is slow and can cost millions of dollars. On
    average, it takes 2 to 5 years for a Voting Rights Act case to
    be completed. For example, in Texas, in 2016, the 5th Circuit
    Court of Appeals found that Texas' photo ID law violated
    Section 2, but during the 3 years of litigation, hundreds of
    elected officials were voted into office, and for the 500,000
    voters who lacked ID, that win came too late.
        LDF has tried to work to address these discriminatory
    changes before they happen, but often, we have been stymied by
    the cost and time that it takes to litigate these matters.
        Given the myriad issues, Congress must act, first, through
    bills like the Voting Rights Advancement Act or the Voting
    Rights Amendment Act. Congress should restore preclearance.
    Congress should also strengthen Section 2 of the Voting Rights
    Act by making it easier for plaintiffs to block discriminatory
    voting changes before an election.
        As we prepare for the 2020 elections, we need to fix our
    democracy, and it should not be up for debate. It is critical
    that Congress make voting easier, not harder. It is time for
    bipartisan unity. It is time to act.
        Thank you.
        [The statement of Mr. Ross follows:]

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        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        And I thank you all for your testimony.
        We will now begin questioning. Each member of the panel
    will have five minutes. I am going to kind of try to hold them
    to that if we can. We have a couple more panels.
        So I would now yield to Chairperson Lofgren for your five
    minutes. You are recognized for five minutes.
        The Chairperson. Well, thank you very much, Chairwoman
    Fudge.
        You know, when Chief Justice Roberts wrote the Shelby
    decision striking down the Voting Rights Act, he said--and this
    is a quote--``voting discrimination still exists, no one doubts
    that.'' So, clearly, the record is ample that discrimination
    continues to occur across the United States, and a compelling
    case has been made why we need to revitalize the Voting Rights
    Act. And I appreciate the testimony you have given today along
    those lines. That is a critical solution.
        Having said that, there are some States that were never
    covered under preclearance, some that bailed out. So I am
    wondering, in addition to the Voting Rights Act, which we are
    committed to, are there other changes or laws that the Congress
    should enact to alleviate the continued effects of racial
    discrimination?
        Ms. Clarke. Thank you for that question. I will observe
    that there are some States, like Tennessee and Kentucky, that
    just barely escape coverage under Section 5, where we are
    seeing extensive voter suppression efforts today. One stark
    example arises out of Tennessee, where after groups on the
    ground made extraordinary efforts to reach almost 90,000 not
    yet registered people, State lawmakers put a new law on the
    book that imposes draconian, burdensome, and costly
    requirements, including criminal penalties on groups that are
    working to register people to vote. No doubt this is a textbook
    example of voter suppression and the kind of tactic that would
    be blocked if we had a Section 5 review process that applied to
    the State of Tennessee.
        As Chairwoman Fudge indicated, we should follow the truth.
    And it is my firm belief that Congress should respond to the
    record that you amassed, indicating where the problems lie, and
    apply a remedy that is responsive to those issues.
        Mr. Ho. Chairperson Lofgren, I thank you for that question.
    There are elements of H.R. 1 that I think would be very
    positive in terms of protecting voting rights. And I just want
    to focus on one, that is the provision of H.R. 1 that provides
    for election day registration. About 20 States have election
    day registration, including the Ranking Member's home State of
    Illinois and your home State of California. The States that
    have election day registration tend to have turnout that is
    about 5 to 10 percentage points higher than the States that
    don't. It is the single reform that there is a--has the
    broadest consensus among political scientists that it
    facilitates participation, particularly among young people,
    mobile voters who have moved recently, African Americans,
    historically disadvantaged groups.
        We have heard a little bit about purges, erroneous removals
    of voters from the rolls. Election Day registration can be a
    valuable safety net in making sure that any voters who are
    purged erroneously do end up getting to participate on Election
    Day.
        The Chairperson. Thank you for that.
        I know my time is almost up, but it also helps if the
    Russians hijack the registration rolls. It is actually
    protection against that kind of cyber mischief, that with same-
    day registration, we would prevent them from ruining our
    elections, but--the final comment.
        Mr. Ross. Thank you, Madam Chairperson. In addition to the
    other provisions of H.R. 1, LDF supports early voting in
    Federal elections. Obviously, it offers the opportunity to cut
    down on some of the election administration issues that we have
    seen, like long lines, voters having to wait three or four
    hours in order to vote. If voters have multiple days on which
    to vote and ample opportunity to do so, then those kinds of
    issues will be cut down.
        I also wanted to briefly comment on a State that was not
    covered by Section 5, which is Arkansas which is the ACLU and
    LDF and others were involved in litigation there to challenge a
    photo ID law, which was successful initially, only for the
    State to turn around and pass a new photo ID law shortly
    thereafter. LDF is currently in court now challenging the way
    in which the Court of Appeals of Arkansas and the Arkansas
    Supreme Court are elected, and the function is that the Court
    of Appeals in particular is elected in such a way that keeps
    black voters from having an opportunity to elect a candidate of
    their choice.
        The Chairperson. Thank you very much. I see my time has
    expired, Madam Chairwoman.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you very much.
        Ranking Member Davis, you are recognized for five minutes.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. And
    thanks again to our witnesses. I appreciate the opportunity and
    I appreciated your testimony.
        I will start with you, Mr. Ho. Do you agree that accurate
    voter rolls are a critical part of our election administration
    and required by the NVRA?
        Mr. Ho. Of course, I do. And part of maintaining accurate
    rolls, I think, is making sure that voters are not purged
    inaccurately.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. What are the best practices, then,
    for maintaining timely voter roll hygiene?
        Mr. Ho. Well, I think about 19 States in recent years have
    adopted a form of automatic voter registration, which ensures
    that when voters move, for example, their registrations are
    automatically updated with the State. It is a way, I think, of
    both facilitating participation and also making sure that there
    isn't so-called dead wood on the rolls of voters who have moved
    but their registration information remains out of date.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. So give me an example of a couple of
    States that have done that and that you support. So you are
    saying once they move, it is automatically updated, and you are
    fine with that, versus other practices that exist in States
    like Ohio, for example, where we did one of our hearings?
        Mr. Ho. Yes. I think it is much better when a voter updates
    their information with the State, whether it is with the DMV or
    a social service agency or something like that, to
    automatically update their registration in accordance with that
    address change, rather than relying on a kind of archaic system
    of sending the voter a card and asking them to write their new
    information on it, or treating the failure to return a piece of
    what looks like junk mail to a lot of people, as evidence of
    the fact that they have moved or are no longer eligible.
        So I think I mentioned, I believe, 19 States have adopted
    some form of automatic registration. This includes States like
    Oregon, Alaska--I don't have the complete list, but the
    National Conference of State Legislatures maintains a very
    comprehensive and up-to-date list of practices like that.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Okay. What has the ACLU's
    interaction with the Election Assistance Commission been in
    trying to address the ballot access concerns that you raise in
    your testimony?
        Mr. Ho. In my role at the ACLU, my primary job is to
    oversee our litigation. So I don't have, myself, direct contact
    with the EAC.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. You haven't sued the EAC?
        Mr. Ho. I am sorry?
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. You have not filed a lawsuit against
    the EAC, right?
        Mr. Ho. Well, I was about to say, my one interaction has
    been litigation against the EAC over--and I detail this in my
    written testimony--over a unilateral, and what the D.C. circuit
    found, unlawful move by former executive director Brian Newby
    to add documentary proof of citizenship instructions to the
    Federal voter registration form.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. So you are not aware of any ACLU
    interaction to try and work with EAC to ensure that we address
    some of your concerns?
        Mr. Ho. I am not, but I think the appropriate person in my
    office to talk to would be a member of our Washington
    legislative office, and I am happy to follow up with them to
    see----
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Please do. Please do.
        Mr. Ho [continuing]. What contacts there have been.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. I appreciate it.
        Ms. Clarke, you mentioned long lines at polling places,
    ineffective language assistance, and faulty technology as types
    of current voter suppression. In your opinion, can we leverage
    21st century technology to address these concerns?
        Ms. Clarke. We absolutely can. And I do think that better
    machines that are not hackable, that provide a paper trail,
    audit system, so that we can ensure public confidence to voters
    when they cast their ballots, that the ballot is indeed being
    handled and the vote is being cast for the person that they
    wanted is incredibly important.
        Georgia is probably exhibit A when it comes to the work
    that must be done to update our voting machines and voting
    technology. In a lawsuit that we brought with the Coalition for
    Good Governance, we got a Federal court to, for the very first
    time in our country's history, overturn and reject the entire
    State system. Georgia is working right now to put in place new
    machines, new technology, and we do think that this will
    produce better outcomes for voters in the State of Georgia
    going forward.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Great.
        Mr. Ross, it was great talking with you before the hearing.
    I am proud to represent what many consider to be the birthplace
    of the NAACP in Springfield, Illinois. We have got great
    opportunities to highlight some of the artifacts from the 1908
    race riots that are being uncovered, and the archaeology is
    happening right now. So I look forward to working with the
    NAACP in the future to get those on display. It is an important
    message to send in the land of Lincoln.
        But one of the areas under the Committee's jurisdiction
    that most concerns me is the ability of those with disabilities
    to vote. With your experience in the election arena, what can
    we do as Congress to help facilitate a better voting experience
    for the disabled?
        Mr. Ross. So I will say that, you know, LDF's work is not
    primarily in the disability rights arena, but we have done--we
    have a Prepared to Vote program, which is focused on election
    day assistance for voters, and one of the things that we often
    see are issues like access to the polls for handicapped voters
    or issues with access for voters who may be undereducated or
    have disabilities like blindness and things like that.
        And so I think one of the things that Congress can and
    should do is to offer more funding for local jurisdictions, for
    updated voting machines, for training of poll workers so that
    they can address these kinds of access issues, and, you know,
    allow for people who want to vote to be able to do so.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Great. Thank you.
        I yield back.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Mr. Aguilar, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Aguilar. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. I appreciate the
    panel and their testimony.
        Ms. Clarke, I will start with you. In your testimony, I
    want to make sure I understood this, how many Section 2
    lawsuits has the current administration filed?
        Ms. Clarke. Zero.
        Mr. Aguilar. We have been in a couple of these hearings
    around the country, and our colleague, Mr. Butterfield, always
    does a very good job, and since he is not here, I will ask his
    question. How much does a Section 2 lawsuit typically cost, and
    what are the resources? And if you could chime in here too
    afterwards, Mr. Ross, what are the resources that go into
    filing a Section 2 lawsuit?
        Ms. Clarke. Thank you for that question. These lawsuits can
    run in the ballpark of hundreds of thousands of dollars.
    Studies have shown that voting rights cases are among the most
    complex cases that are heard by Federal courts. Often, these
    cases require that civil rights groups, like ours, retain
    experts to conduct extensive demographic analyses, produce
    maps, and so forth. This is not a sustainable way to deal with
    the crisis of voter suppression and widespread rampant voting
    discrimination that we face in our country. These cases are not
    just costly, but they are long and protracted and can take
    several years to bring to final resolution, meaning that voters
    on the ground are literally experiencing and living the effects
    of having a discriminatory law or practice on the books in
    their community each and every single day.
        I started off my career in the Justice Department enforcing
    the Voting Rights Act. Section 5 was a part of that work. It is
    a preemptive strike to discrimination. It means that officials
    in Texas and Georgia and all the places that we have been
    talking about today would never have been allowed to put these
    discriminatory tactics on the books if we had Section 5 in
    place.
        I think the work that this Committee is doing is critical
    to the fate of American democracy, and I hope that it yields to
    a place where we can have Section 5 restored and its
    prophylactic protections back on the books.
        Mr. Aguilar. Mr. Ross.
        Mr. Ross. Sure. So just to follow up on what Ms. Clarke
    said, is that one of the things that have been found is that
    voting rights cases take up the sixth most judicial resources
    in terms of cases. So it is not only money and time of the
    parties who are litigating it, but also the Federal courts. One
    of the reports that I cite too in my written testimony that LDF
    created shows, not only the cost for the plaintiffs, but also
    the cost for these jurisdictions to litigate Section 2 cases
    and then lose them. This is a cost to taxpayers, to both black
    and white voters for these discriminatory changes and
    jurisdictions being, for lack of a better word, hard-headed in
    not recognizing that they have violated Federal law.
        Also, it will take, as I said in my testimony, somewhere
    between 3 and 5 years for these litigations to obviously be
    resolved. And for States like Alabama and Texas and other
    places that enact discriminatory photo ID laws or other
    barriers that affect hundreds of thousands of voters, these
    people have to wait years and years for any kind of relief to
    finally happen. And it is important that we think about the
    costs of not having Section 5, of not having an administrative
    process that is less costly, less burdensome, and protects
    voters beforehand.
        Mr. Aguilar. Mr. Ho, if you want to respond to that, I will
    let you, but I did want to ask you if the loss of proactive
    Federal protections has made it more difficult to track changes
    to voting laws that could have a discriminatory impact and so--
    and how we categorize and track them in the future. But if you
    also want to chime in on the cost for Section 2.
        Mr. Ho. Sure. Thank you for those questions. Section 2
    cases are quite expensive. I detailed in written testimony to
    the Judiciary Committee earlier this year one case in North
    Carolina which cost, I think, around $5 million to litigate
    over a 3-year period. That testimony also described 10 ACLU
    Section 2 cases, which were ultimately successful in the sense
    that we either got a ruling in our favor or a settlement for
    our clients. While those cases were pending, a total of 350
    local, State, and Federal officials were elected under laws
    that were later determined to be discriminatory. So we have
    lost a lot without the preclearance regime in place.
        I think about half of successful Section 2 cases
    nationally, since Shelby County, were brought at the local
    level, were changes to voting laws are much more difficult to
    keep track of and I think underscores precisely what we have
    lost.
        Mr. Aguilar. Thank you so much.
        Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Let me just wrap up. I am from Ohio which I do believe
    should be a preclearance State. For the last four--or five
    elections actually, the rules have changed every single
    election, either the number of days that are allowed for early
    vote, what you need to bring to vote.
        I live in a county of more than a million people. We have
    one early voting site. One. So the State would say that we want
    uniformity, we want all 88 counties to be exactly the same. But
    we have counties that have 5,000 people and we have counties
    that have over a million people. Uniformity is not really
    fairness or equity. So I think Ohio should be in that number.
        I also think that as we sit here as members, we have to
    have a desire to do the right thing. In Ohio, for the first
    time, we have been able to work with our secretary of state,
    who, by the way, is a Republican, because he believes that
    everyone should have the right to vote. And so instead of
    purging 230,000 people, which is what he thought he was
    required to do, he decided we are going to cross-check with the
    DMV. We are going to let the League of Women Voters look at the
    list. We are going to let the NAACP look at the list. Within
    weeks, automatically, 40,000 had been removed from that number,
    and the number continues to grow. So it can be done if we want
    to do the right thing.
        And I would just ask my colleagues that the next time we
    open up a Congress and we start to read the Constitution, let's
    just be clear that that is something that we want to follow.
    When we disenfranchise people who have paid their debt to
    society, we have violated the Constitution. It says every
    citizen, every American. We don't take away a citizenship when
    we incarcerate you, and especially when you have paid your
    debt.
        So I want to thank you all for the work that you do. We
    need more people doing this kind of work and raising awareness
    of what is happening in our communities, because there are many
    people, like some of my colleagues, who do not believe that
    anything is wrong with our system, that believe it is okay to
    have these strict voter ID laws. And I would suggest to them
    when they come up with examples like, well, you know, you have
    to have a certain ID to get on a plane or you have to have one
    to get a movie, those are not rights. Voting is a right. And so
    we need to be encouraging people to vote and not trying to
    discourage them.
        So I thank you so much for your testimony today, and I just
    appreciate your being here. Thank you so much.
        And we would--our next panel, we are going to call our next
    panel. Thank you very, very much.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you very much. We have a lot going
    on this morning, so people are all over the place. The Ranking
    Member has an Agriculture hearing. The Chairperson has a
    Science hearing. I am actually supposed to be in another one as
    well. So people will come and go. So forgive us for that.
        Welcome.
        For our second panel, we have--Catherine Lhamon is the
    Chair of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. President Obama
    appointed Ms. Lhamon to a 6-year term on the Commission on
    December 15, 2016, and the Commission unanimously confirmed the
    President's designation of Ms. Lhamon to chair the Commission
    on December 28, 2016.
        Ms. Lhamon also serves in the cabinet of California
    Governor Gavin Newsom, where she has been Legal Affairs
    Secretary since January 2019, and has served as an Assistant
    Secretary for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Education
    until 2017.
        Welcome.
        Michael Waldman is President of the Brennan Center for
    Justice at the NYU School of Law, a nonpartisan law and policy
    institute that focuses on improving systems of democracy and
    justice. The Brennan Center is a leading national voice on
    voting rights, money in politics, criminal justice reform, and
    constitutional law.
        Mr. Waldman, a constitutional lawyer and writer, who is an
    expert on the Presidency and American democracy, has led the
    Center since 2005. Mr. Waldman was Director of Speechwriting
    for President Bill Clinton from 1995 through 1999, serving as
    an Assistant to the President.
        Welcome, sir.
        Brenda Wright is the Senior Advisor for the Legal
    Strategies at Demos. Ms. Wright has led many progressive legal
    and policy initiatives on voting rights, campaign finance
    reform, redistricting, election administration, and other
    democracy and electoral reform issues and is a nationally known
    expert in these areas. Ms. Wright has argued two cases before
    the Supreme Court on campaign finance and voting rights and has
    written extensively on democracy and voting rights issues.
        Welcome.
        Elena Nunez serves as Director of State Operations and
    Ballot Measure Strategies at Common Cause. Ms. Nunez joined
    Common Cause in 2006, managing a successful drive to win voter
    approval for the State's ethics law which limits the influence
    of lobbying money in State politics. She previously was
    campaign manager for Amendment 27, Common Cause's successful
    2002 statewide campaign finance reform initiative.
        I thank you all.
        And the same will apply. You will all be recognized for 5
    minutes. The light will turn green when you begin. It will turn
    yellow whether you have 1 minute left and red when it is time
    for you to wrap up.
        You are recognized for 5 minutes.

     STATEMENTS OF THE HONORABLE CATHERINE E. LHAMON, CHAIR, U.S.
     COMMISSION ON CIVIL RIGHTS; BRENDA WRIGHT, SENIOR ADVISOR FOR
     LEGAL STRATEGIES, DEMOS; MICHAEL WALDMAN, PRESIDENT, BRENNAN
        CENTER FOR JUSTICE; AND ELENA NUNEZ, DIRECTOR OF STATE
         OPERATIONS AND BALLOT MEASURE STRATEGIES, COMMON CAUSE

             STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE CATHERINE E. LHAMON

        Ms. Lhamon. Thank you.
        Chairwoman Fudge, Ranking Member Davis, members, thank you
    very much for inviting me to testify this morning.
        I chair the United States Commission on Civil Rights, and I
    come before you today to speak about the Commission's current
    work evaluating voter access and voting rights, as described in
    our report, released in September 2018, titled ``An Assessment
    of Minority Voting Rights Access in the United States.''
        Drawing from Commission research and investigations and
    memoranda from 13 of the Commission's State advisory committees
    who analyzed voting discrimination in Alabama, Alaska, Arizona,
    California, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, New
    Hampshire, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Texas, this report documents
    current conditions evidencing ongoing discrimination in voting.
    On every measure the Commission evaluated, the information the
    Commission received underscores that discrimination in voting
    persists.
        Our report found that, at the time we issued the report, at
    least 23 States have enacted newly restrictive statewide voter
    laws since the Shelby County decision in 2013. These statewide
    voter laws range from strict voter identification laws, to
    voter registration barriers such as requiring documentary proof
    of citizenship, allowing challenges of voters on the rolls, and
    unfairly purging voters from rolls, to cuts to early voting, to
    moving or eliminating polling places.
        The conclusions the report draws are bleak, leading to
    unanimous Commission findings that, for example, during the
    time period studied, race discrimination in voting endures
    today. Likewise, voter access issues and discrimination
    continue today for voters with disabilities and limited English
    proficient voters.
        Following the Supreme Court's decision in Shelby County, in
    the absence of the preclearance provisions of Section 5 of the
    Voting Rights Act, voters in jurisdictions with long histories
    of voting discrimination have faced discriminatory voting
    measures that could not be stopped prior to elections because
    of the cost, complexity, and time limitations of the remaining
    statutory tools.
        As a result, the Commission recommends that Congress should
    amend the Voting Rights Act to restore and/or expand
    protections against voting discrimination that are more
    streamlined and efficient than existing provisions of the act.
        This new coverage provision should take into account the
    reality that, one, voting discrimination tends recur in certain
    parts of the country; and, two, voting discrimination may arise
    in jurisdictions that do not have extensive histories of
    discrimination.
        Because this committee has visited and heard testimony from
    voters and experts in several States, I will focus my attention
    on issues of voter access that the Commission and our advisory
    committees found in other States. Here are just some examples
    of what voters experienced, raising concerns of discrimination
    based on race and disability status.
        With respect to strict voter identification laws, in
    Kansas, our advisory committee received testimony from a Native
    American voter who reported being denied the right to use her
    Tribal ID as acceptable identification when voting, even though
    Tribal ID is acceptable under State law. She testified she was
    so flustered when she was denied that right that she did not
    ask for a provisional ballot and she did not vote that day.
        With respect to inappropriate purging, our Indiana advisory
    committee found, quote, certain racial and ethic minorities may
    be disproportionately susceptible to a false hit in Crosscheck,
    which is a program widely used to identify voters who may be
    registered in more than one State.
        With respect to scarce and difficult-to-access polling
    places, our Louisiana advisory committee received testimony
    that demonstrated that the racial makeup of an area is a
    predictor of the number of polling locations in that area and
    that there are fewer polling locations per voter in a
    geographical area if it has more black residents.
        In one notable instance in Alaska, a polling place was
    moved away from a village, and, thereafter, Native Alaskan
    voters could only access their polling place by plane.
        With respect to inaccessible polling locations for voters
    with disabilities, in New Hampshire, 100 percent of voters with
    disabilities were unable to vote privately and independently in
    municipal elections in 2013 because none of the polling places
    had set up an accessible voting system.
        With respect to voter intimidation, in Illinois, a county
    clerk reported that in Cicero, Illinois, police officers have
    harassed voters and asked people for voting permits, which
    don't exist, and testified that between 60 and 70 off-duty
    Chicago police officers were armed and present at the polls,
    intimidating Cicero residents, who were predominantly Latino,
    and it took the county clerk's office between four and five
    hours to clear the police officers from the polling place.
        These distressing data and information regarding ongoing
    voter discrimination form a basis for our call to Congress to
    improve our voting protections to ensure that ours is a real
    democracy.
        On this difficult day of Congressman Elijah Cummings'
    passing, I want to close by reminding us all of what he has
    said about voting. Quote, ``On my mother's dying bed, 92 years
    old, former sharecropper, her last words were, `Do not let them
    take our votes away from us.' She had fought and seen people
    harmed, beaten, trying to vote. Talk about inalienable rights.
    Voting is crucial. And I don't give a damn how you look at it;
    there are efforts to stop people from voting. That is not
    right. This is not Russia. This is the United States of
    America.''
        Rest in peace, Congressman Cummings.
        [The statement of Ms. Lhamon follows:]

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        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you very much.
        Ms. Wright, you are recognized for 5 minutes.

                       STATEMENT OF BRENDA WRIGHT

        Ms. Wright. Thank you, Chairwoman Fudge and Ranking Member
    Davis, for the opportunity to testify today.
        It is a privilege to be testifying before this Subcommittee
    at a time when it is doing such important work at this critical
    moment in our democracy. And I believe it is fitting in these
    times to start out with a big-picture reflection on the history
    of the right to vote in America because of the light it sheds
    on what is needed to make that right real today, given the
    threats it is facing today.
        One starting point to notice is that, when people recount
    the story of the evolution of the right to vote in the United
    States, you often hear a narrative of how it has enjoyed
    basically just a steady expansion, from exclusion to inclusion,
    since our Nation's founding.
        So the narrative starts with how the right to vote
    initially was reserved only to white men who owned property,
    and then it went on to include formerly enslaved men through
    the 15th Amendment; then the 19th Amendment that gave women the
    right to vote; then the Voting Rights Act that gave crucial
    protections against racial discrimination; then 18-year-olds
    through the 26th Amendment, et cetera. And so the narrative
    that you hear suggests that we have finally reached the point
    where everyone can register and vote.
        Now, all of those advances have been critically important,
    and I am not dismissive of them at all, but I think that the
    work that this committee has done over the past many months
    shows us that that is not a correct picture of our history.
        Instead, as many advocates and historians have lifted up,
    the right to vote in America has always been contested. It has
    achieved gains, and it has suffered setbacks. Progress has been
    met with pushback. And each generation has had to fight and
    struggle to achieve or expand or defend the right to vote. Each
    generation has had to do that in its own way and under its own
    circumstances.
        Now, that leads us to today. As we have already heard
    through the witnesses today and as you have heard in your
    previous hearings, the right to vote today is under attack, and
    it is under attack in numerous ways.
        And to avoid repeating what has already been said, I would
    like to focus on an issue of enforcement of an existing law
    that we do have which has been seriously neglected by the
    current Department of Justice, and that is the National Voter
    Registration Act of 1993.
        That Act requires States to provide voter registration
    through public assistance agencies when people are applying for
    benefits, and it requires States to provide voter registration
    when people engage in driver's license transactions.
        Demos has spent a number of years now investigating the
    extent to which States are complying with those laws, and we
    have found in State after State that, through neglect, through
    bad administration, those opportunities for voter registration
    have often been neglected.
        We have worked in over 20 States, and they are red States
    and blue States. It is not just concentrated in one region of
    the country. One of our first cases was in Ohio. And we have
    worked, over the years, both cooperatively with States and in
    litigating against them, to raise up the level of compliance
    with those very important voter registration opportunities.
        One of the things that really concerns us is that, under
    the current Department of Justice, there have been no
    enforcement actions to enforce either Section 5 or Section 7 of
    the National Voter Registration Act. And that is a big problem.
    We can't cover the entire country on our own.
        I want to also focus on one group of U.S. citizens that
    remains formally locked out of the vote at some point in their
    lives across almost the entire United States, and that is
    people with felony convictions. This is a stain on our
    democracy, and it formally disenfranchises more than 5 million
    Americans who are denied the right to vote because of criminal
    convictions.
        And because our criminal legal system disproportionately
    targets, arrests, sentences, and locks up people of color,
    communities of color are represented among disenfranchised
    Americans far beyond their representation in the population.
    For example, a national survey on drug use reported that
    African-Americans and whites use drugs at similar rates but the
    imprisonment rate of African-Americans for drug charges is
    almost six times that of whites.
        So to achieve the goal of a full enfranchisement that is
    central to democracy, we must reform our current laws that
    disenfranchise persons with felony convictions. Such laws are
    not required by the U.S. Constitution, and they have not been
    the law forever. In fact, in Maine and Vermont and in many
    other countries, including most of Europe, all people who are
    incarcerated can vote. There is simply nothing inevitable about
    vote stripping.
        And, certainly, the practice in some States of permanently
    disenfranchising people even years after they have completed
    their sentences is indefensible.
        I want to just touch on one other issue in the time
    remaining, because the issue of criminal disenfranchisement is
    compounded by the practice of prison-based gerrymandering.
    Prison-based gerrymandering happens because the United States
    Census counts incarcerated persons as residents of the prison
    where they are incarcerated rather than as residents of their
    home community. And because prisons are often located far away
    from the home community of incarcerated persons, counting them
    in that manner awards disproportionate representation to rural
    or semi-rural communities containing prisons at the expense of
    representation for the home communities of incarcerated
    persons.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank----
        Ms. Wright. Thank you. Sorry to go over my time just a
    little bit.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you very much.
        Ms. Wright. Thank you for allowing me to testify here.
        [The statement of Ms. Wright follows:]

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        Chairwoman Fudge. Mr. Waldman, you are recognized for five
    minutes.

                      STATEMENT OF MICHAEL WALDMAN

        Mr. Waldman. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman and Members of the
    Subcommittee, for this important hearing--for this important
    series of hearings.
        The thing we all share, the premise we all share, is that
    the vote is the heart of American democracy. In so many ways,
    the right to vote is sacred. And, as we know, we have had to
    fight for this right for over two centuries--to expand it, to
    make it real, to ensure that it is something that all Americans
    can truly share.
        We are now one year out from this very pivotal election,
    and it is plain that the systems of democracy and our electoral
    system is under tremendous stress at this moment. As has been
    described, 25 States in the last decade have enacted new laws
    to make it harder to vote, for the first time since the Jim
    Crow era. And those laws have hit hardest communities of color,
    young people, old people, poor people. Voter suppression
    unfortunately remains real and remains a real threat to our
    ideals.
        And so the question for all of us and for this committee
    and this Congress is: What can we do to ensure that the 2020
    election will be free and fair and secure? And, going forward,
    what can we do to modernize and improve our election systems so
    they truly represent all Americans?
        Our belief, strongly, is that the best way to respond to
    attacks on democracy is to strengthen democracy. As we have
    looked--and I describe this in our testimony from the Brennan
    Center for Justice--as we have looked at the landscape of the
    current election, I want to identify three particular
    challenges, three particular threats, among many, to be
    concerned about.
        The first is the prospect of abusive voter purges. And we
    have heard some things about that today. We all care about
    having accurate and complete voter rolls. Seventeen million
    people were removed from the voter rolls over the last two-year
    period we studied. And the rate of purging was far higher in
    the States that had previously been covered by Section 5 of the
    Voting Rights Act than in the rest of the country. And that has
    remained true over two election cycles. That is a concerning
    and a, frankly, suspicious fact that should make us be
    troubled, that these removals are not merely hygiene but
    something more pernicious than that.
        The second concern that we have relates to election
    security, something that Members of Congress of both parties
    have worked on this year. We all know that in 2016 Russia
    attacked our democracy. As Director Coats testified, the lights
    are blinking red for not only Russia but other potential
    hostile actors trying to take advantage of the holes and risks
    in our system.
        There has been progress. In 2016, 20 percent of people
    voted on machines without paper backup records. By 2020, there
    is a good chance that, in at least the hotly contested States
    in the Presidential election, that number could be down to
    zero. But more must be done.
        And the third considerable threat that I want to point to
    is, following on what my colleague has said, the denial of the
    right to vote to many, many people, especially in the State of
    Florida, who have had their right to vote restored by Amendment
    4 to the Florida Constitution, which passed in a strong
    bipartisan vote, with 64 percent of the vote, and which now is
    being, we would argue, gutted--attempting to be gutted by the
    Florida legislature. And there is litigation to redress that
    that we are part of.
        Going forward, what reforms would make a big difference?
    Well, first of all, we agree that it is vital to restore,
    reauthorize, and modernize the Voting Rights Act so that it can
    fully and once again protect the voting rights of all Americans
    and those who face racial discrimination.
        Second, we strongly support H.R. 1, which we believe is the
    most significant and sweeping democracy reform legislation
    since 1965. That would include automatic voter registration,
    which has been described as a transformative reform that would
    add tens of millions to the rolls and make lists more accurate
    and secure.
        And, finally, election security. We applaud the House of
    Representatives for its recent move to authorize $600 million
    to help States meet this threat. We are encouraged that the
    Senate seems to be coming along, at a lower level. We encourage
    the House to stand firm in conference and in negotiations both
    at the proper amount of funding but also to make sure that the
    money is actually used for the purpose it is designed for.
        The bottom line on all of this is, the public really cares
    about this. There is a great hunger for this. In the 2014
    election, it was the lowest voter turnout in 72 years; and in
    the last midterm election, last year, it was the highest voter
    turnout since 1914. Ballot measures passed all over the country
    for democracy reform. It is a democracy movement from all over
    the country, all political views. The people are out there. And
    we encourage Congress to continue to play your role in making
    this a reality for our country.
        Thank you.
        [The statement of Mr. Waldman follows:]

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        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Ms. Nunez, you are recognized for 5 minutes.

                        STATEMENT OF ELENA NUNEZ

        Ms. Nunez. Thank you, Chairwoman Fudge, for inviting me to
    testify before the House Administration Committee Elections
    Subcommittee today. And thank you to Chairwoman Fudge, Ranking
    Member Davis, and all Members of the Subcommittee for holding
    this critically important hearing.
        My name is Elena Nunez, and I am the Director of State
    Operations and Ballot Measure Strategies for Common Cause. We
    are a national, nonpartisan watchdog organization with 1.2
    million supporters and 30 State organizations throughout the
    country.
        For nearly 50 years, Common Cause has been holding power
    accountable through lobbying, litigation, and grassroots
    organizing. We fight to reduce the influence of big money in
    politics, enhance voting rights for all eligible Americans,
    strengthen ethics laws to make government more responsive, and
    stop gerrymandering.
        We were founded by Republican John Gardner at a time when
    Republicans and Democrats came together to work on the pressing
    issues of the day. During the 1970s, Common Cause worked with
    many Members of Congress, Democrats and Republicans alike, to
    help pass major democracy reforms that sought to correct some
    of most egregious abuses of power, including the Federal
    Election Campaign Act and the Ethics in Government Act.
        Similarly, each of the five times the Voting Rights Act has
    been reauthorized, it had strong bipartisan support before
    being signed into law by a Republican President.
        However, as you have heard from many of the witnesses
    today, in the aftermath of the Supreme Court's Shelby County
    decision, voting rights have become an increasingly politicized
    issue.
        You have heard about many of the attacks on the right to
    vote through voter purges, polling place closures, and
    restrictive forms of voter ID, so I am going to focus my
    testimony on some of the more subtle forms of voter suppression
    that can keep people from being able to participate.
        One tactic that we are seeing in increasing numbers is the
    placement of polling sites at police stations or having a law
    enforcement presence at other polling sites, which can have a
    chilling impact on voters.
        In 2016, Macon, Georgia, election officials tried to move a
    voting precinct to a police station in a largely African-
    American community. And throughout the country, in advance of
    the 2016 and 2018 elections, rumors circulated online and via
    fliers that Immigration and Customs Enforcement would be
    patrolling voting locations.
        We are also seeing a growing trend of voter suppression
    through misinformation. Voters may be given misinformation
    about registration requirements, polling locations, or ballot
    deadlines. In 2016, automated social media accounts, likely
    connected to the Internet Research Agency, some of which were
    targeting African-American and Latino voters, falsely claimed
    that voters could vote from home for Hillary Clinton.
        Increasingly, election administration practices around
    signature processes are a growing concern for voter
    suppression. Signature mismatch laws can significantly affect
    voters with disabilities, women who get married or divorced,
    seniors, and people for whom English is a second language,
    among others.
        The often arbitrary application of the law can lead to bias
    by election officials, nearly all of whom are not handwriting
    experts, because in most cases there are not uniform standards,
    and all too often there are not adequate provisions to cure a
    signature if there is a question.
        In Florida in 2018, most of the roughly 10,000 votes not
    counted because of voter error were thrown out because of
    signature mismatches. One study found that young voters and
    voters of color were more likely to have their ballots rejected
    and they were less likely to cure those problems.
        We believe that voters are best able to participate when
    they have convenient options to cast their ballots. Efforts to
    reduce options, namely by reducing opportunities for early
    voting, is another form of suppression that we have seen in
    North Carolina, Ohio, and Wisconsin, among other States.
        In North Carolina in 2013, the legislature cut a week of
    early voting, a move that was eventually overturned by a court
    because the change targeted African-Americans with ``surgical
    precision.''
        In addition to reducing the number of days of early voting,
    we are seeing a trend towards eliminating or reducing options
    during evenings and weekends, times that are often most
    convenient for working people. These changes have a
    disproportionately discriminatory impact, as African-American
    voters tend to use early voting more than white voters do.
        While long lines are often viewed as a sign of high voter
    interest, there can also be an indication of voter suppression
    when the lines are an inevitable result of poor planning or
    inadequate resources. Machine failures due to aging voting
    equipment and delays in checking in voters due to poor voter
    rolls can create backups that have a ripple effect.
        The U.S. has not made election day a national holiday or
    mandated paid time off to work, so many eligible voters cannot
    take unpaid leave to wait in line for multiple hours to cast a
    ballot. Vote suppressors, recognizing this dynamic, can starve
    localities for resources so that the actual in-person voting
    process takes longer than Americans are able to spend.
        Our goal should be a system where all eligible voters can
    cast ballots without barriers and have confidence that their
    votes are counted accurately. Many States, through litigation,
    ballot measures, and State legislative efforts, are fighting
    voter suppression and expanding voter access.
        To make sure that voters throughout the country can have
    quality access, Federal action is needed by adopting the For
    the People Act, H.R. 1; the SHIELD Act, including the Deceptive
    Practices and Voter Intimidation Prevention Act; and the Voting
    Rights Advancement Act.
        Thank you again for the opportunity to testify today, and I
    look forward to answering your questions.
        [The statement of Ms. Nunez follows:]

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        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you very much.
        Thank you all.
        We will now the begin with our questioning, and I will
    recognize Mr. Aguilar for five minutes.
        Mr. Aguilar. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
        Ms. Lhamon, I will start with you, but, also, as the
    Californian up here, thank you for your service.
        Ms. Lhamon. Thank you.
        Mr. Aguilar. The Legal Affairs Secretary is no small
    position in California. So I will be sure to talk to you about
    San Bernardino County and any judicial vacancies in another
    platform.
        Ms. Lhamon. I look forward to that conversation.
        Mr. Aguilar. You know, but this is for the entire panel. In
    this chamber, even just yesterday, the Ranking Member talked
    extensively about ballot harvesting.
        And so, Ms. Lhamon, can you talk a little bit about what
    the California experience has taught us, the barriers that
    individuals have, you know, specifically the kind of robust
    vote-by-mail system that we see?
        But this is becoming hyper-political. And some of my
    colleagues across the aisle are conflating voter fraud with
    legitimate exercising of our electoral process. And they have
    blamed losses, congressional losses, on this, basically telling
    folks that thousands of ballots just kind of show up, the
    inference being that individuals are just grabbing other
    people's ballots. It is just becoming hyper-political.
        So can you talk a little bit about ballot harvesting? And
    is there evidence? Was there any testimony given to you and
    your Commission supporting claims of widespread voter fraud
    that a lot of my colleagues have used, obviously, to pass
    increased voter suppression laws?
        Ms. Lhamon. Not only was there no evidence given to the
    Commission about widespread voter fraud, the data and the
    research that is bipartisan reflect that voter fraud is
    vanishingly rare in this country.
        So the concerns about that type of vote misuse both have
    existing criminal penalties in the Voting Rights Act for voting
    twice and State and Federal penalties for the kinds of voter
    fraud that already exist. And so it is duplicative and also
    harmful to initiate strict voter ID, among other kinds of
    requirements, in the name of combating voter fraud.
        But, also, the existence of voter fraud, as I mentioned,
    essentially does not exist. And the testimony, both that we at
    the Commission received and also that our State advisory
    committees received across the many States that investigated
    this question, just don't find the existence of voter fraud at
    all.
        And that extends, as I mentioned, from bipartisan research.
    So The Heritage Foundation, the Republican National Committee,
    a number of conservative-leaning as well as nonpartisan
    organizations have researched this question and consistently
    and persistently find that voter fraud essentially does not
    exist in this country.
        Mr. Aguilar. Any others on the panel?
        Ms. Nunez, then Mr. Waldman.
        Ms. Nunez. Thank you.
        I think one thing that is important to keep in mind when we
    talk about ballot harvesting, as it is known, is that the
    system works when we give voters options to cast ballots, and
    that also means giving them options on how they return them.
        So I think, in terms of past practices, you want to give
    voters multiple options. And for some voters, that may be
    giving their ballot to another person.
        I think, specifically, though, there is some good input
    from the Native American Rights Fund, specifically, about how,
    for Native voters, being able to have someone else return their
    ballot for them is critically important. And there is a whole
    set of factors as to why that is the case, having to do with
    the distance from polling locations for voters who are living
    on a Native reservation.
        But the upshot is that if we don't allow voters to choose
    how to return their ballots, we are not giving them the
    opportunity to take advantage of that expanded access that can
    come through a mail ballot or absentee ballot system.
        Mr. Aguilar. And as this panel heard testimony in Arizona,
    the definition of family in Native American culture might be
    very different----
        Ms. Nunez. Precisely.
        Mr. Aguilar [continuing]. Than we might know.
        Mr. Waldman.
        Mr. Waldman. First, in terms of the broad claim, the
    illusory claim, of widespread voter fraud, the Brennan Center's
    research has shown that, in terms of in-person voter
    impersonation, you are more likely to be struck by lightning
    than to commit voter fraud in the United States. And that is
    just an established fact.
        The real issue here is we want to make it easier for people
    to vote. About one out of three Americans now votes before
    election day. This is, in a sense, a matter of consumer choice.
    People need this kind of convenience.
        It is already illegal everywhere to fill out an absentee
    ballot for someone. And we have seen, where there have been
    problems, that that has been what has been going on. There is
    no evidence of an actual----
        Mr. Aguilar. And that is election fraud, and that is
    illegal already.
        Mr. Waldman. And it is done to voters, not by voters.
        Mr. Aguilar. Yeah.
        Mr. Waldman. There is no evidence that people helping
    collect ballots has actually caused impropriety. And we ought
    to be looking for ways to deal with actual risks to the system
    rather than things that are less real.
        Mr. Aguilar. Thank you so much. I appreciate it.
        Ms. Wright, maybe 10 seconds?
        Ms. Wright. Sure. I mean, I would just mention that a lot
    of harm has been done in the name of combating voter fraud.
        And one of the best examples is that the first victims of
    the Indiana voter ID law that was put into place was a group of
    a dozen nuns, residing at a convent, who showed up at the
    polls, the place they had always voted. They didn't have
    driver's licenses, they didn't have passports, and they had to
    be turned away, even though the poll worker was one of the nuns
    who lived with them and knew each one of them personally. But
    they didn't have the right ID, so they couldn't vote.
        We should really avoid doing harm in the name of protecting
    against nonexistent voter fraud.
        Mr. Aguilar. Thank you, Ms. Wright.
        Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Ranking Member Davis, you are recognized for five minutes.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Thank you.
        And I appreciate the discussion on ballot harvesting. We
    had an interesting discussion yesterday on ballot harvesting. I
    just find it odd that we have a State where it is still
    illegal; somebody going to jail. We had a special election.
        I have a chain-of-custody concerns. And I think all of us,
    we want to make sure that every ballot is cast and every ballot
    is counted correctly. We ought to all be concerned about chain-
    of-custody issues.
        And I think the process can easily be manipulated. That is
    what we saw in North Carolina. And, frankly, until it was legal
    in California, you know, somebody there may have gone to jail
    for the same thing. We may have actually been able to
    investigate whether the fraud existed a little better.
        I am interested in finding that RNC study you talked about.
    I haven't seen it, but we will call--my team will call over,
    but I would love to get with you afterwards, Ms. Lhamon.
        And thank you all for your testimony.
        Look, we all want to make sure that everybody has a chance
    to vote. We all want to make sure that the processes are in
    place to give every single citizen in this country who is
    eligible to vote the right to cast that ballot.
        I am in Illinois. Obviously, we have many provisions that I
    am supportive of. Same-day registration, that allows folks in
    my area to actually have every opportunity to cast that vote.
        But we also can't take away what we have already seen
    happening. Mr. Waldman said in his opening testimony, we saw
    tremendous increase in midterm voting in 2018. Great. Great.
    Let's not sidestep that success. Let's build on it. Let's work
    together and say, this is great, it is working.
        Ms. Wright, you mentioned--well, I will come back to you. I
    have a couple of questions real quick for Ms. Lhamon.
        Ms. Lhamon, I don't have Native American Tribes in my
    district, but I know you mentioned them in your opening
    testimony. For my knowledge, how many Native American Tribes
    are there in the United States?
        Ms. Lhamon. I don't have that number off the top of my
    head, but it is a not-small number.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Okay. You know, you said you have
    heard from Native Americans across this country about their
    difficulties in casting votes. What has the overall trend been
    for Native American turnout across the country over the past
    few election cycles?
        Ms. Lhamon. It continues to fall below the 50-percent
    threshold that was the basis for enacting the Voting Rights Act
    in the first place, looking at turnout. So very, very serious
    concerns in particular for Native American voters.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. So they didn't follow the same trend
    from 2014 to 2018 in the midterms?
        Ms. Lhamon. They may have been up, but it is well below the
    50-percent threshold.
        So the concern is that Native Americans in this country
    continue to have very, very difficult challenges for voting.
    Their polling places have been reduced. The Native IDs, as I
    mentioned, are not always accepted, even though they ought to
    be accepted. There are considerations of vote by mail----
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. I was at one of our field hearings
    in North Dakota, in Standing Rock Reservation. Great people.
    Great opportunity to hear about a process that doesn't exist in
    my home State of Illinois. They actually have no registration
    process in North Dakota. I mean, you walk in and prove you have
    an address in North Dakota, same day, boom, you are there.
        Ms. Lhamon. That is singular in the United States.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Yeah. And then, all of a sudden,
    even with no registration, they were allowing the Native
    American Tribal leaders to verify anybody with just a letter
    from the Tribe as somebody who lived there to go vote.
        So you are saying there are still more things that we need
    to do, right?
        Ms. Lhamon. We have substantial challenge with respect to
    Native American voters in North Dakota, among other States----
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. And I also heard in North Dakota
    that the turnout was substantially higher. I mean, there is
    improvement.
        Ms. Lhamon. And improvement is wonderful and ought to be
    celebrated. My only point is that it is below 50 percent and
    that that is a very serious concern.
        We ought to be celebrating increased turnout wherever it
    exists. And we also ought to be recognizing that, across the
    board, in this country, we have very, very low turnout for
    voters. And that is, in itself, a concern.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Okay. Well, then what other
    processes would you recommend to increase voter turnout in
    Native American areas and other areas?
        Ms. Lhamon. Well, certainly with respect to Native
    Americans, we want to make sure that there are accessible
    polling places, that people have clarity, including in Native
    languages, about how to vote and what is involved in voting.
    The Alaska State advisory committee for the Commission heard
    astonishing testimony about failure of translated materials,
    failure of people available to----
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Newer technology, 21st-century
    technology can be helpful.
        Ms. Lhamon. It would be helpful. And, also, there are
    particular challenges in places like Alaska, where there are 23
    different languages----
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Absolutely.
        Ms. Lhamon [continuing]. In which materials need to be
    translated.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. I apologize. I do have one more
    question for Ms. Wright.
        And I want to get to you. You mentioned prison in the
    Census counts, how they may unfairly give an advantage to rural
    areas if the prisoners are counted, and it may adversely affect
    the home areas of those prisoners.
        Were you saying that assuming that most would come from
    more urban areas?
        Ms. Wright. No. The vote dilution comes in when population
    is counted as if it were----
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. As it is----
        Ms. Wright [continuing]. Rather than at the prison.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. So the population is counted, and
    the Census----
        Ms. Wright. Right.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois [continuing]. Is used, the data is
    used for the area----
        Ms. Wright. Instead of in their home communities. And----
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Okay. So would that same application
    be valid for colleges and universities, where rural students go
    to urban areas?
        Ms. Wright. Well----
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Does that unfairly punish the rural
    areas?
        Ms. Wright. But in colleges and universities, students do
    have the right to register and vote in those communities if
    they----
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. They didn't commit----
        Ms. Wright [continuing]. Intend to stay there.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois [continuing]. A crime that put them
    in prison.
        Ms. Wright. Yes, but the point is, when you look at the
    logic of how this system works--take Maine and Vermont, for
    example. When incarcerated people in Maine and Vermont cast
    their ballots, they don't cast them in the prison community.
    They cast them absentee from their home communities. And yet
    the Census Bureau is counting them as residents of the prison.
    And that just doesn't match up, and it creates all kinds of
    inequities.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Well, I appreciate your logic, and I
    just don't necessarily know if I agree with it. But thank you
    for your time.
        And thank you all.
        I yield back.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you very much.
        Let me just say a few things, as we were talking about
    Native Americans.
        First off, I think it is illegal for us to even hold them
    to State standards. Their treaties are with the Federal
    Government, and they should only be held to the standard that
    the Federal Government has and not to what the States have.
    That is number one.
        Number two, I think it is important that we understand that
    in 2018 their numbers were up because the Tribal leaders had to
    go and get new IDs for all of the people on their particular
    reservations. When you look at the fact that on some
    reservations in this country the unemployment rate is above 60
    percent, they were not going to go and buy IDs. They would not
    have voted had not resources come from either the Tribal
    leaders or others in their community to help them get a new ID,
    an ID that had to put an address on it. They have never had an
    address in all these years. They have used post office boxes.
    But, all of a sudden, we are going to make it more difficult,
    because now they have to have an actual address to go and vote.
        I am just trying to figure out--maybe you can help me--why
    is it that they don't want us to vote? Can somebody answer that
    question for me?
        Just answer it. Anybody. Why are they making this
    difficult? I mean, why do we not have bipartisan support
    anymore? Just somebody help me figure it out. Because, I mean,
    is it just because of the way I look, or what is it? Please.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Madam Chairwoman, are you
    insinuating that I don't want you to vote? Republicans?
        Chairwoman Fudge. First, let me just say, I am asking the
    question of the panel.
        And, secondly, I am not asking anything. I am just asking
    the question, why has it become so difficult for people of
    color, for Native Americans, for young people--I mean, you want
    to equate people in prison to kids in college. That is insane.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Actually----
        Chairwoman Fudge. The question----
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Will the gentlelady yield?
        Chairwoman Fudge. I am reclaiming my time.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Will the gentlelady yield?
        Chairwoman Fudge. No, I am reclaiming my time. I will not
    yield. The question is to the panel.
        Ms. Lhamon. The increases in impediments to the right to
    vote are extraordinarily distressing. And I think that the
    reasons can be many, but the reality is that the right to vote
    is a core component of democracy. And we, as a country, should
    do better, can be better, ought to be better than we are right
    now in terms of placing those impediments.
        Chairwoman Fudge. So what is the purpose of placing those
    impediments? That is what I am trying to get to. What is it in
    somebody's psyche that believes that, all of a sudden, in the
    last 10 or 12 years, that voting has gone so off the rails that
    we have to change things we have been doing for hundreds of
    years? There was no problem before; why is there a problem now?
    I just don't understand it.
        Mr. Waldman.
        Mr. Waldman. I think, when you look at the whole history of
    the country, it has unfortunately but inevitably required a
    fight to expand and maintain the right to vote and the right to
    participate. As the country is changing demographically, once
    again we are seeing a backlash, and we are seeing laws enacted
    that make it harder for communities of color, immigrant
    communities, and others to vote.
        Happily and fortunately, in the past and in many ways even
    now, there is still bipartisan and left/right support for these
    things. The last time the Voting Rights Act was before this
    Congress, it passed the Senate 98-to-nothing. So many of these
    measures we are describing as significant reforms have been
    enacted with bipartisan support.
        In the State of Illinois, automatic voter registration
    passed unanimously and was signed into law by Governor Rauner,
    a Republican Governor of Illinois. And in Florida, a massive
    bipartisan majority voted to restore the right to vote to 1.4
    million Florida residents who had their right denied because of
    a past felony conviction, which was a direct remnant of the Jim
    Crow era.
        So there is still, deep in the soul of the country, a
    belief in the right to vote. And we all encourage all of you
    and all of us to work to modernize the system so some of these
    fights can be in the past and not in the present.
        Chairwoman Fudge. I guess I am just trying to make a point
    that this same thing--it seems to have just taken on a life of
    its own. Nobody knows where it started; nobody knows why it
    started. We know that it has always been an issue. Voting has
    been an issue in this country for a very, very long time. But I
    would say this: I can trace my family back at least six
    generations in this country. I am as American as anybody in
    this room. I do not believe that people like me, who have
    helped build this Nation, who have never done anything to hurt
    this country, should be made to go through all kinds of hoops
    to be able to do what the Constitution gives us the right to
    do.
        All these people who say they believe in the Constitution,
    they can't possibly, because it says that we all have a right--
    an unfettered, unabridged right to vote. It doesn't say you
    have to have a certain kind of ID. It doesn't say that if you
    have been to prison you can't vote. You are still citizens of
    this Nation.
        And so, for to us start to put all of these roadblocks in
    the way, I can't figure it out. You can't figure it out. So it
    is like this has a life of its own.
        But I would suggest to you this: that the more we try to
    erode the rights of people in this country--it is not going to
    stop at voting. It is going to get worse. And if we really are
    patriots and believe in what the Constitution says and believe
    in this great Nation, then we need to make it easier to vote.
        We want to go out here and talk about every other country
    and what they don't do. I bet you, any other democracy in this
    world doesn't do what we do. We should make it a holiday. We
    should make a vote on Saturday, maybe. We should give people
    time off to vote. But, no, we still vote on an agrarian
    calendar day that doesn't even make any sense to do today.
        So I am going to ask each of you, if you would, tell me one
    thing you want to us do to make it easier for people to vote in
    this country.
        We will start with you, Ms. Lhamon.
        Ms. Lhamon. I certainly believe automatic voter
    registration is enormously helpful. And allowing people to be
    able to vote on the day of an election would be extraordinarily
    helpful. So if I had to pick one thing, that would be it.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        And, Ms. Wright, I agree with you, by the way. If we
    continue to count prisoners where they are, when they leave and
    come home, the resources that come from that Census count are
    going to stay in those places where they no longer are. And the
    people who have to take care of them, whether it be through
    Second Chance, whether it be through some other kind of
    diversion programs, whatever it may be, we don't have the
    resources in our community.
        Your one point?
        Ms. Wright. There are so many things that need to be done.
    It is very hard to pick one.
        It is certainly vital to restore some version of the
    preclearance provisions of the Voting Rights Act that were
    struck down in 2013, because that really did unleash the
    floodgates, as we have seen. And that has been an enormous
    weakening of the right to vote.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Mr. Waldman.
        Mr. Waldman. In addition to what has been mentioned, a
    national guarantee of effective early voting and election day
    registration to make it possible for as many people in our
    modern, mobile, and overworked age to vote.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Ms. Nunez.
        Ms. Nunez. All of the above.
        I think it is important to make sure it is convenient to
    both register and vote. So same-day registration and automatic
    voter registration are key to having accurate rolls. And then
    we need to make sure people can cast ballots in a way that
    makes sense, whether that is early, at home, or in a polling
    location on election day.
        Chairwoman Fudge. I thank you all so very, very--did you
    want to make a comment, Mr. Davis?
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. Thank you all very much. I
    appreciate the opportunity to hear from you your suggestions.
    We look forward to continuing to work with you as this
    Subcommittee and, in turn, the House Administration Committee
    moves forward.
        I appreciate the discussion on Census activities. You know,
    the discussion that the Chair and I had here momentarily when I
    asked her to yield--at the time, she didn't. Thank you for
    doing it now. Please don't insinuate that my discussion on
    Census activities and fairness in rural America when it comes
    to other folks who may be counted in areas that they may not
    live in permanently, and the resources in rural America are
    just as important as anywhere else. So that is my discussion.
    And I apologize if I thought you insinuated that there was
    anything other than that, but my discussion was simply on the
    Census track.
        And I am glad that we are having these hearings to talk
    about the need to get more folks to vote. That is what needs to
    happen. But let's also make sure that, every single election,
    every vote is counted and every vote gets to the ballot box.
        I yield back.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        And just to be clear, your discussion about college
    students that have a choice--people in prison do not. And for
    the Ranking Member to say, ``Well, they didn't commit a
    crime''--it had nothing to do with whether they are both
    counted in the same place or not. It just really didn't.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. It is about fairness when it comes
    to the Census. If they are going to be counted in one part of
    the country--if they are going to be counted in rural America
    for whatever resource purpose there is, the same resources,
    when college graduates go back to their communities where they
    live to take advantage of the resources that are offered in
    workforce investment programs, are just as important as the
    resources that we all, in a bipartisan way, agree to fund in
    every part of America.
        Let's--if we want to talk about the Census----
        Chairwoman Fudge. Mr. Davis.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois [continuing]. We can talk about it,
    but----
        Chairwoman Fudge. Mr. Davis, those people, many of them,
    vote at home in the first place.
        Mr. Davis of Illinois. As somebody who represents four
    public universities, I can tell you, a lot of them don't.
        Chairwoman Fudge. But they have a choice.
        Ms. Wright, did you want to say something?
        Ms. Wright. Well, with your indulgence, I guess I would
    just like to say that the issue of prison gerrymandering is
    clearly an injustice, but in terms of the importance of the
    issues, if I could name one other issue, it would simply be the
    re-enfranchisement of people who have lost the right to vote
    because of criminal conviction. That, in itself, is the core of
    the problem, and prison gerrymandering is one aspect of it.
        Chairwoman Fudge. It is unconstitutional is what it is.
        Thank you all so very, very much for being here.
        I thank this panel, and we will ask the next panel to
    please come to the table.
        [Recess.]
        Chairwoman Fudge. Good morning.
        We want to welcome our third panel. The Ranking Member is
    going have to leave us briefly but is planning to return. So
    thank you all so much for being here.
        Ms. Hannah Fried is the Director of All Voting Is Local, a
    collaborative housed at The Leadership Conference Education
    Fund in conjunction with the American Civil Liberties Union
    Foundation, the American Constitution Society, the Campaign
    Legal Center, and the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under
    Law. Ms. Fried has run voter protection efforts for two
    Presidential campaigns and spent several years in Federal
    Government services at the Department of Justice and the
    Environmental Protection Agency.
        Welcome.
        I know I am not doing this in order, but Ms. Barbara
    Arnwine--how are you?--is the National co-Chair of the National
    Commission for Voter Justice. Ms. Arnwine is also the President
    and Founder of the Transformative Justice Coalition and served
    as head of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law
    from February of 1989 through June of 2015. Ms. Arnwine is
    renowned for her contributions on critical justice issues
    including passage of the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1991 and
    the 2006 reauthorizational provisions of the Voting Rights Act.
        Welcome.
        Denise Lieberman is the Director of Advancement Project's
    Power and Democracy Program and a senior attorney. Ms.
    Lieberman works to identify and remove systemic barriers to
    voting. A seasoned constitutional and civil rights lawyer, Ms.
    Lieberman works on the ground in Missouri, in addition to
    advancing broad voter protection initiatives nationwide,
    engaging in political analysis, lobbying, legal advocacy,
    litigation, and community-building to advance electoral reform,
    including spearheading a nationwide advocacy effort to combat
    repressive voting legislation this past year.
        Welcome.
        Ms. Kase serves as the Chief Executive Officer of the
    League of Women Voters of the United States, where she is
    leading the organization through a period of rapid
    transformation and growth, focused on building power by
    engaging in advocacy, legislation, litigation, and organizing
    efforts centered around issues of voting rights and democracy
    reform. Prior to joining the League in 2018, she served as COO
    of CASA, an organization at the forefront of the immigrant
    rights movement, representing nearly 100,000 members.
        As you know, you will see a lighting system in front of
    you. When you begin, the light will turn green. When you have 1
    minute left, you will see the yellow light. And when you see
    the red light, please prepare to wrap up.
        Ms. Fried, you are recognized for 5 minutes.

      STATEMENTS OF HANNAH FRIED, DIRECTOR, ALL VOTING IS LOCAL;
    VIRGINIA KASE, CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS;
      BARBARA ARNWINE, NATIONAL CO-CHAIR, NATIONAL COMMISSION FOR
       VOTER JUSTICE; AND DENISE LIEBERMAN, SENIOR ATTORNEY AND
       PROGRAM DIRECTOR, POWER AND DEMOCRACY, ADVANCEMENT PROJECT

                       STATEMENT OF HANNAH FRIED

        Ms. Fried. Thank you, Chairwoman Fudge and Members of the
    Subcommittee. I am Hannah Fried. I am the Campaign Director for
    All Voting Is Local, a collaborative campaign of The Leadership
    Conference Education Fund. We fight to eliminate discriminatory
    barriers to voting before they happen. Since 2018, we have
    worked in Arizona, Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
    Thank you for the opportunity to testify.
        Our election system is broken. In 2016, problems at the
    polls prevented 1 million voters from casting a ballot. These
    problems disproportionately harm voters of color, young people,
    low-income Americans, and voters with disabilities.
        In the past two decades, Congress has recognized the need
    for strong Federal protections for the right to vote, passing
    the Help America Vote Act in 2002 and reauthorizing the Voting
    Rights Act in 2006. Both passed with strong bipartisan support
    and a robust record.
        Despite this, in 2013, five Supreme Court Justices gutted
    the critical protections of the Voting Rights Act Section 5
    preclearance system. Since the Shelby case, States and
    localities across the country have erected barriers to voting
    without critical safeguards.
        Federal protections for voting are as vital today as they
    have been for the past century. The 2018 elections were lauded
    for record turnout, but eligible Americans voted at a rate of
    less than 50 percent and faced insurmountable obstacles.
        State officials purged voters from the rolls, sometimes
    simply for not voting. From 2010 to 2018, Georgia's Secretary
    of State, now-Governor Brian Kemp purged more than 1.4 million
    voters.
        Worse still, some States are more committed to purges than
    to ensuring an accurate list maintenance process. In 2018,
    Georgia's ``exact match'' law put into question the
    registration status of 50,000 voters over minor inconsistencies
    in their registration records.
        Just recently, Ohio's Secretary of State admitted their
    purge system was rife with errors. Just shy of half a million
    Ohioans, many of them African-American and low-income voters,
    will be purged this year under this flawed system.
        In 2018, voters faced large-scale polling place changes.
    The Leadership Conference Education Fund's ``Democracy
    Diverted'' report found that, in former Section 5 States, there
    were 1,173 fewer polling places in 2018 than in 2014, despite
    last November's record turnout. Maricopa County, Arizona, 31
    percent Latino, closed 171 polling locations after 2012, the
    most of any county studied in the report.
        Widespread polling place changes lead to the overuse of
    provisional ballots. Our campaign's analysis of 717 former
    Section 5 counties found that voters in counties with more
    polling place closures are more likely to be asked to cast a
    provisional ballot.
        HAVA contemplated that provisional ballots would be used as
    a failsafe, but they are less likely to be counted than a
    regular ballot. Their overuse is the canary in the coal mine,
    signaling systemic problems that result in voters not knowing
    where or how to vote.
        Our campaign's analysis of provisional ballot usage has
    found strong connections to race. In Pennsylvania, voters in
    Philadelphia County, 41 percent African-American, are five
    times as likely to get a provisional ballot than voters in
    Allegheny, 12.7 percent black, or Berks, 4 percent black.
        In 2018, African-American students faced unique barriers to
    voting. At Ohio's two HBCUs, voters cast a disproportionate
    number of provisional ballots and were twice as likely to have
    their ballots rejected than voters countywide. In Florida in
    2018, Florida A&M University, the State's sole public HBCU, was
    the only major public campus without an early vote site.
        In 2018, voters of color were more likely to have problems
    voting by mail. An analysis by All Voting Is Local of our
    States found that voters in mostly white communities are less
    likely to have their mail-in ballots rejected than voters
    living in communities of color.
        In Arizona, just over 1 percent of Native American voters
    are on the State's permanent early voting list, compared to
    approximately 80 percent of non-Native-American voters.
        In 2018, strict photo ID laws targeted African-American
    voters with almost surgical precision, as the Fourth Circuit in
    2016 wrote of North Carolina's law. Last fall, our campaign
    helped hundreds of Wisconsin voters through the arduous process
    of complying with that State's strict photo ID law, a law that
    has been found to deter from voting more than 20 percent of
    African-American registered voters compared to 8.3 percent of
    white registrants.
        Election administration practices can and should be used to
    expand access to the ballot for all eligible Americans. Too
    often, they instead become a barrier to voting,
    disenfranchising millions of eligible Americans, particularly
    voters of colors.
        Any wrongfully disenfranchised voter is one too many.
    Congress must restore and expand safeguards of the right to
    vote, ensuring that every eligible American, regardless of
    race, income, age, or ability, can make their voice heard.
        Thank you.
        [The statement of Ms. Fried follows:]

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you very much.
        Ms. Kase, please, five minutes.

                       STATEMENT OF VIRGINIA KASE

        Ms. Kase. Chairwoman Fudge, Ranking Member Davis, and
    Members of the Subcommittee, my name is Virginia Kase, and I
    serve as the Chief Executive Officer at the League of Women
    Voters of the United States. Thank you for the opportunity to
    testify today on voting rights and election administration in
    America, an issue of paramount importance to our organization.
        The League of Women Voters is nonpartisan, founded nearly
    100 years ago in 1920 by women who understood the importance of
    securing voting rights for women. The League is active in all
    50 States as well as the District of Columbia, with 764 local
    affiliates, in every congressional district in our country.
        In 1965, the Voting Rights Act outlawed racial
    discrimination in voting and established procedures to protect
    equal access to the vote for everyone. Despite a long history
    of support from legislators of all political parties, in 2013
    the Supreme Court overturned key provisions of the VRA in the
    case of Shelby County v. Holder.
        Since that decision, politicians across the country have
    passed unnecessarily restrictive legislation and adopted
    practices that discriminate against and disenfranchise voters
    of color and minorities whose first language is not English,
    making it harder for them to register and much more difficult
    to vote.
        These restrictive legislative initiatives included efforts
    to implement photo ID requirements in States like Texas,
    Wisconsin, Missouri, and Pennsylvania.
        The League pushed back against efforts to roll back early
    voting hours in Ohio, and we pushed back against efforts to
    roll back and eliminate pro-voter reforms like preregistration
    and same-day registration in North Carolina. Essentially, the
    Shelby decision weakened the Voting Rights Act as a mechanism
    to fight discrimination by striking down important preclearance
    and oversight provisions.
        These suppressive laws have a major impact on our
    elections: excessive, long lines in urban areas, where
    minorities reside; consolidation of polling sites with little
    or no notice; reduction in early voting hours that limit
    participation; massive voter purges with no effective notice
    that cause registration barriers on election day; and
    inadequate numbers of machines in areas where early voting
    showed a clear influx in voter participation.
        And because these issues repeatedly show up in areas with
    large minority populations, in States like Georgia, Florida,
    North Carolina, Arizona, Michigan, Ohio, and Texas, it is
    unlikely that this scheme was incidental or unintentional but,
    instead, expressly targeted the growing population of the new
    American majority, including minorities, youth, and income-
    sensitive individuals. In effect, these suppressive laws shut
    out millions of the new American majority and denied citizens
    the protection of their right to vote.
        With these minority-targeted voting barriers road-tested,
    the 116th Congress has a momentous opportunity to restore
    voting rights in this country. The opportunity to strengthen
    the Voting Rights Act by creating a new formula that would
    trigger preclearance of certain changes to voting laws and
    administrative practices is needed now more than ever. And the
    creation of a national notification process that lets all
    voters know when changes to election processes may occur
    ensures that voters are informed prior to them showing up to
    the polls on election day.
        If Congress fails to act immediately, this will be the
    first redistricting cycle to occur without a fully functioning
    Voting Rights Act and will allow States to push through
    unjustifiable changes to their laws that will have a direct
    impact on voters for a decade.
        Without continued oversight and safeguards in place to
    protect voters from all backgrounds, it is left to
    organizations like the League of Women Voters and other
    nonprofit voting rights group to inform and protect voters
    affected by these policies and practices.
        But that should not be the sole role of the League and our
    partners. It is the responsibility of government to create and
    enforce laws that prevent barriers in the democracy our
    forefathers designed to foster an open, transparent government
    powered by the people, for the people--all of the people. It is
    the duty of government to protect the rights of voters and to
    encourage participation in our political system, not create
    barriers that prevent participation.
        As we have for nearly 100 years, the League looks forward
    to working across the aisle to determine the points of
    consensus for any and all voting rights legislation considered
    before Congress. We look forward to working with elected
    leaders to protect and uphold their responsibility of ensuring
    voters have the unobstructed ability to exercise their right to
    vote.
        Thank you again for the opportunity to testify on the
    importance of restoring the Voting Rights Act, and I look
    forward to taking questions and continuing to work with you all
    on this important issue.
        [The statement of Ms. Kase follows:]

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you very much.
        Ms. Arnwine, you are recognized for five minutes.

                      STATEMENT OF BARBARA ARNWINE

        Ms. Arnwine. Thank you, Chairwoman Fudge, Ranking Member
    Davis, and Members of the Subcommittee. Thank you for the
    opportunity to testify today on this important topic.
        I want to dedicate my remarks, of course, to the memory of
    Congressman Elijah Cummings.
        My name is Barbara Arnwine. I have already been introduced.
    I am here representing the National Commission for Voter
    Justice, which was conceived by Reverend Jesse Louis Jackson,
    Sr. He is represented here today by Reverend Todd Yeary of
    Baltimore.
        And I want to make sure that we get this into the record,
    that this Commission was formed in July 2017 to respond to the
    myriad voter suppression measures in the post-Shelby v. Holder
    era.
        Also, many will recall President Donald Trump's manifold
    assertions, post-election, of pervasive voter fraud and his
    subsequent creation of the now-defunct Presidential Advisory
    Commission on Election Integrity. We felt there was an urgent
    need instead to counteract his dangerous and erroneous
    narrative and instead provide a truthful account of the urgent
    need for the protection of our democracy from the insidious
    threat of the modern era of voter suppression.
        I created the Map of Shame in April of 2011, which was the
    first national tool to expose and educate the American public
    about the rise of contemporary voter suppression measures.
    Since I released the Map of Shame, there has been erected a
    formidable and substantial regimen of disenfranchising barriers
    to the ballot box and to the ability to have the votes counted
    for millions of eligible but vulnerable voters.
        Since its launch in January 2018, the Commission has held a
    series of hearings, compiled over 14 State reports looking at
    voting rights, and has engaged in many voter education and
    other efforts.
        One thing that we heard in June of 2018 from Professor
    Donald Jones of the University of Miami was that when the only
    real proper way to look at this era that we are in is
    understanding that when it comes to voting rights, America is
    facing a second civil war. That is how extreme this period is.
    This reality of an active war against the rights of American
    citizens to exercise the right to vote and have their votes
    counted is supported by mounting evidence when we consider the
    myriad of voter suppression laws passed in the States, the
    multitude of voting rights cases filed in the State and Federal
    courts, the numerous reports documenting actions by the States
    which have impaired the rights of citizens to vote and have
    their vote counted, and the continuing negative cases from the
    Supreme Court, and the new insidious threat of Russian use of
    social media, as documented by the Senate Select Committee on
    Intelligence investigation report.
        We also have created a new tool and document that is called
    the 61 Forms of Voter Suppression. And let me be very clear
    that a year ago, this was less than 30. That the creativity,
    the insidiousness, the rapid expansion of voter suppression
    measures is that extreme and it is growing. If I were to do
    this today, I would probably add four more. That just shows you
    how creative these States are being and how persistent they are
    being in pursuing this.
        Our major findings of our hearings have been already
    expressed by some of the testimony, but I just want to make
    clear one point. I mean, there are two really critical things
    that we need to appreciate today. One is that when Shelby v.
    Holder was decided, we were only 18 months into the regimen of
    modern voter suppression. We are now eight years deep into this
    regimen, and the Congress now knows a lot more than the Supreme
    Court knew back in 2013. So you have substantially more
    evidence about the impact of the absence of a preclearance
    mechanism.
        The second thing I want to make clear is that nothing in
    the world can substitute for preclearance to prevent racial
    discrimination, and that in this era of massive voter
    suppression, that this clumsy and ineffective regimen that
    exists is not enough.
        So we want to commend the Congress. We want to commend you
    for this hearing.
        We have things we would like to move into the record: The
    testimony of Reverend Jesse Jackson, the 61 Forms of Voter
    Suppression, and, of course, I would like to expand my remarks.
        Thank you so much.
        [The statement of Ms. Arnwine follows:]

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        With no objection, so ordered. Thank you very much.
        Ms. Lieberman, you are now recognized for five minutes.

                     STATEMENT OF DENISE LIEBERMAN

        Ms. Lieberman. Thank you, Chairwoman Fudge and Members of
    this Subcommittee, for holding this important hearing today on
    voting rights and election administration. My name is Denise
    Lieberman. I am the Director of Power & Democracy at
    Advancement Project National Office.
        Advancement Project is a national racial justice
    organization that works in deep partnership with grassroots
    organizations to develop community-based solutions that are
    inspired by the tactics that produced the earlier landmark
    civil rights victories. We are proud to stand behind our many
    partners on the ground in the States who are fighting battles
    for racial justice and the right to vote. And the need is
    great. We are faced today with the greatest battle for the
    solvency of our democracy since the post-Reconstruction era.
        I am particularly gratified, Chairwoman Fudge, that this
    Subcommittee has chosen to have a people's panel, because our
    fight to protect the right to vote and the need for Congress to
    take definitive action to secure the right to vote for all
    citizens lies in the lived experiences of the people for whom
    protection is most needed and the people whose voices are most
    often silenced. Because at the end of the day, the right to
    vote is about self-determination, the right of people to make
    decisions about their own lives and their own destinies. It is
    about dignity. It is society's structural mechanism that says
    you count, literally. And so when the right to vote is denied
    or abridged, it says you don't count.
        And so this is a very, very personal matter. As much as it
    is policy, as it is legal, and we need to understand all of
    these statistics, it is deeply rooted in the basic human
    dignity of all people.
        And we also know that any remedial actions that this body
    takes are going to need to be justified in legal challenges
    based on the record of the lived experiences of the people who
    these measures impact most.
        So Advancement Project has been pleased to work in
    collaboration with other members of the Racial Equity Anchor
    Collaborative to support this Subcommittee's field hearings
    that you have held over the last eight months, documenting the
    state of voting rights in jurisdictions around the country. The
    Anchor Collaborative members, which include Advancement
    Project, Asian & Pacific Islander American Health Forum, Demos,
    Faith in Action, the NAACP, National Conference of American
    Indians, the National Urban League, Race Forward, and UnidosUS,
    are all dedicated to advancing a voting system that is free,
    fair, and accessible to all people, regardless of race,
    ethnicity, ability, or language proficiency.
        In addition to helping identify leaders on the ground to
    testify at this Committee's field hearings, the Anchor
    Collaborative partners embarked on a robust grassroots effort
    to lift up the voices of everyday voters of color and their
    experiences. So to complement the field hearings, we conducted
    a series of people's hearings in select States to gather
    firsthand accounts of voter suppression, and through the
    creation of a website, We Vote We Count, where voters across
    the country can share their voting experiences.
        We held hearings in States like Alabama, North Carolina,
    Ohio, North Dakota, South Dakota, Georgia, Florida, and Texas,
    and heard from voters firsthand. Witnesses there attested to,
    among other things, having to wait in long lines to cast
    ballots, being denied bilingual ballots or language assistance
    at the polls, being denied disability assistance at the polls,
    having to restore their registration status after an illegal
    purge, undertaking onerous barriers to restoring their voting
    rights after a criminal conviction, having to stand up to last-
    minute changes to polling locations and hours of operation,
    rampant misinformation, and voter intimidation.
        The reports also capture the impact of voter ID laws, cuts
    to early voting, the increasingly scarce polling places in
    ever-changing locations, which present significant burdens for
    those without easy access to transportation or inflexible work
    schedules.
        And the results were clear. Since the loss of Federal
    oversight in the post-Shelby era, voters of color across the
    country are confronted with renewed barriers to casting a
    ballot. We have documented these reports in a soon to be
    released report called ``We Vote We Count: The Need for
    Congressional Action to Secure the Right to Vote for All
    Citizens,'' which includes testimonies from African Americans,
    Asian Americans, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islanders, Hispanics,
    and Native Americans, whose firsthand accounts provide a
    glimpse into the inner workings of actual access to the ballot
    around the States, and compel this body to take action to
    restore the preclearance provisions of the Voting Rights Act.
        What we saw around the country is that voters have lost
    confidence in the wake of the Shelby decision in the ability of
    the Department of Justice to fairly secure their right to vote.
    And so we know that the Shelby decision emboldened attacks on
    the right to vote, not just in the former preclearance States,
    but around the country, designed to curtail the growing
    political power of voters of color as they emerge into the new
    American majority.
        And so we thank you today, Congresswoman Fudge and members
    of this Committee, for holding this hearing. Please heed the
    words of these voters across the country and take action to
    secure Federal protection for the right to vote.
        Thank you.
        [The statement of Ms. Lieberman follows:]

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Thank you all so much.
        Mr. Aguilar, you are recognized for five minutes.
        Mr. Aguilar. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. Thank you to the
    panelists.
        Ms. Lieberman, I will start with you, and then we can work
    our way across, because you spoke about barriers in your new
    report. Can you talk to me about some of the most common
    barriers? You know, we have taken testimony, and we have gone
    around the country and we have seen quite a few. Talk to us
    about what your research tells you are the barriers that you
    often find, but also specifically, if the panel can talk a
    little bit about vulnerable and emerging populations and the
    types of barriers that those constituencies face.
        Ms. Lieberman. Absolutely. And what we saw was that voters
    were reporting difficulties at every step of the process, from
    registering to vote, to casting a ballot, to having those
    ballots counted. We have seen a rise in discriminatory voter
    registration procedures, onerous processes for being able to
    register to vote, and particularly, onerous processes for
    people who are attempting to restore their rights to vote,
    either after an illegal purge or after having their rights
    suspended due to a felony conviction.
        We just heard, for example, last week in Louisiana during
    early voting, from voters who, despite having gone to numerous
    government agencies in the wake of last year's passage of Act
    636, which restored voting for people with felony convictions
    who have been out for five years, were still not able to cast a
    ballot, despite having jumped through numerous hoops and
    hurdles. Those hoops and hurdles were pervasive throughout the
    processes that voters described, through polling place closures
    and changes, to having to drive numerous hours.
        Witnesses in Alabama testified to the closure of over 30
    DMV locations in disproportionately African American and poor
    counties after that State enacted a voter ID law, causing
    people to have to drive sometimes up to four hours to get to a
    process. I could go on and on, but these populations are
    significantly impaired.
        In North Dakota, a witness testified to, in a county that
    has a 36 percent poverty rate, the barriers of people having to
    drive numerous hours just to get all the underlying documents,
    to get the IDs, in order to vote under that State's ID law. So
    what we found is that they are pervasive throughout the voting
    process.
        Mr. Aguilar. Ms. Arnwine.
        Ms. Arnwine. Yes. We found that the populations that we
    looked at were--sorry again--the populations we looked at were
    African Americans, Latinos, Native Americans, Asian Americans,
    low-income voters, voters with disabilities, student voters,
    formerly incarcerated persons, newly naturalized citizens,
    voters displaced by natural disasters, and homeless voters.
    These are some of the most vulnerable voters, and they are
    really bearing the brunt of the voter suppression. And by our
    calculation, millions of voters have been denied or blocked
    from voting who come from those categories. Not to mention
    those who are LGBTQIA and may have changed their identity,
    name, or sexual identity.
        We found that of the measures, the 61 Forms captures a lot
    of these measures, because that is how many there really are.
    There are so many more. But most former--but most of the ones
    that you have already heard, some of them, such as our
    witnesses talked about targeted poll closures, exact-match
    requirements for registration and for counting absentee
    ballots. The refusal to place polling sites on student
    campuses, which is now a big fight again in Texas, but that was
    a huge issue in Florida. And coming out of our hearing, there
    was a lawsuit filed that challenged the refusal to put polling
    places on student campuses in Florida for early voting, and
    they won it. And they were able to have those polling sites in
    2018.
        We also heard about voter caging, especially in Michigan,
    and in many other States; Texas, Alabama. Voter purging, that
    was one of our first hearings that we really start realizing up
    front, by the third hearing, we knew that voter purging was a
    huge problem in our country.
        And I still think that, realistically, the ability to
    intercept and fight voter purging has been one of the weakest
    parts of our community's ability to respond. And it is
    problematic because it is widespread, and there is many States
    where there is no activity going on to stop it.
        Onerous voter ID, failure to follow State procedures, like
    we saw in South Carolina, where they failed to follow their own
    procedures as to staffing of polling places, resulting in
    literally some of the longest lines in, you know, targeted
    minority neighborhoods. We also saw abuses of provisional
    balloting, disparate impact between white and people of color
    jurisdictions created by the failure to provide adequate
    election equipment and staffing, racial gerrymandering, cuts to
    early voting----
        Chairwoman Fudge. Ms. Arnwine, I am going to have to cut
    you off.
        Ms. Arnwine. Yes, okay. But I just want to--he asked me.
        Chairwoman Fudge. If you want the other two to quickly
    answer, we can----
        Ms. Arnwine. Yes.
        Mr. Aguilar. If you could.
        Ms. Arnwine. Sorry.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Ms. Arnwine. Yes.
        Ms. Kase. So I will go quickly. Just a few examples in
    addition to the ones that have been cited. For example, when we
    see people who have finally become re-enfranchised after being
    incarcerated, there are additional attacks on that by requiring
    them, for example, in Florida, to pay fines, a restitution, in
    order to be able to do that. So every single time you see that
    we try to overcome these barriers, there are new ones that are
    put in people's places.
        Recently, we had a Supreme Court decision, Russo v. Common
    Cause. The League of Women Voters was part of that case. And we
    now are very concerned that we are going to see partisan--I
    mean, racial gerrymandering disguised as partisan
    gerrymandering, because there has basically been a green light
    for that. We have seen broken down election equipment. The
    League is on duty every election day. We are looking in every
    congressional district, looking at--seeing what is happening on
    the ground.
        We had six-hour lines in Georgia because of broken down
    voter equipment. And we are doing rapid response. It should not
    be the responsibility of nonprofit organizations like ours to
    have to do rapid response because the government is not doing
    what they are supposed to be doing to enfranchise voters.
        Senior citizens, rural communities, minorities, and youth
    all having difficulties accessing IDs. Third-party voter
    registration criminalization, like what recently happened in
    Tennessee, that we were able to fight back and combat once
    again. And so it is just these constant, constant attacks that
    communities are facing, and we, organizations like ours, are
    being responsible for addressing these.
        Mr. Aguilar. Thank you, Ms. Kase.
        Ms. Fried, I am so sorry.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        And just, by the way, did you know that the director of the
    League of Women Voters was on the purge list in Ohio?
        Ms. Kase. Yes, I did. And we have had many situations like
    this. One of the oldest voting rights organizations in the
    country, and we are not immune.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Ms. Fried, if you want to answer very,
    very quickly, I will let you.
        Ms. Fried. I will. Thank you.
        What I would like to highlight from what my fellow
    panelists have said is that the problems that American voters
    are facing are not singular; they are stacking. A voter who has
    a problem getting a voter ID, then get to the polling--has to
    drive miles to get to their polling place, then there is a line
    at the voting location; these problems are not singular in
    their origin. And our solutions, our response to them, needs to
    be across the spectrum. There need to be both Federal statutory
    protections as well as State administrative protections, laws
    and practices that expand access to the ballot, particularly in
    communities of color.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you. Thank you.
        Let me just--just for a moment, just pretend that I am
    Chief Justice Roberts, and I would just like for you to make
    the case as to why we should fully reinstate the Voting Rights
    Act and what you think the preclearance formula should look
    like, if you have any idea. We are going to start at your end,
    Ms. Fried.
        Ms. Fried. Thank you. In between 2013 and 2018, there were
    almost 1,700 polling places that closed in former section 5
    jurisdictions. The Leadership Conference released just earlier
    this fall a report discussing these changes. Seventy-five
    percent of those happened between 2014 and 2018, despite the
    increase in turnout in 2018.
        Voter suppression is pervasive. Voters in this country face
    extraordinary barriers to the ballot. Our ability to vote, the
    ability particularly of communities of color to vote, is,
    frankly, miraculous in light of the barriers that they face.
    This is especially true in former Section 5 areas. Poll
    closures, voter ID laws, a lack of access to early vote,
    particularly in communities of color, restrictive hours of
    early vote, these problems are widespread, and they are
    pervasive, and we aren't seeing the kinds of improvements to
    them that we need to be.
        What preclearance allowed us to do was to understand, not
    only that changes are happening, but the impact that they have.
    Without preclearance, we can't understand fully the impact on
    communities of color of these changes. It is absolutely vital
    that preclearance be restored.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Ms. Kase.
        Ms. Kase. If you were Chief Justice Roberts, I would say
    that we have three bodies of government for a reason. And the
    Supreme Court's job is to serve as a representative of the
    American people. And when we see people's rights being violated
    time and time again--and the most fundamental right that we
    have as citizens of this country is our right to vote, to have
    our voice heard--that the Supreme Court has a responsibility to
    protect that right so that every citizen is considered equal.
        We talk about equal under law. We should be equal in the
    ballot box. And it means removing barriers for each citizen to
    exercise that right.
        But I would say that there are already remedies that you
    all have in place that have been proposed. And one of the ones
    that we are really in favor of is the formula under
    Representative Sewell, which is statewide having 15 or more
    violations over the past 25 years, at least one of which was
    committed by the State itself. In political subdivision, three
    or more violations during a calendar year. Voting violations,
    voting violations of the 14th or 15th violations. I mean, you
    have all of this information yourself, so I don't want to waste
    too many people's time, because there is just too much to read
    off. But the formula is here, and we support these formulas,
    and we think that Congress must act. You must act now, because
    we are coming into very serious elections this coming year.
        Chairwoman Fudge. I will just ask you this question. Most
    of what you are talking about really goes back to the original,
    you know, 14 or so jurisdictions. But what about States like
    Ohio that was not covered under preclearance? What about States
    like Pennsylvania and Wisconsin?
        One of the things that the Supreme Court was concerned
    about is that they were determined to say that that is such an
    old record and the data is so old that we can't prove that they
    should still be held to the same standard of preclearance. But
    I think that the situation is worse and it is bigger. So what
    do we do to include those new jurisdictions?
        Ms. Kase. We need to, first of all, do a better job of
    tracking what is happening so that we can ensure that it is a
    living and breathing process, meaning that it doesn't end after
    a certain amount of time; that on an annual basis, we are able
    to look at where there have been violations and ensure that
    those protections are in place where we are seeing them
    happening.
        And yes, you are right, it has expanded. It hasn't gotten
    better. It has, in fact, gotten worse. In 2013--since 2013, we
    have seen that time and time again.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Ms. Arnwine.
        Ms. Arnwine. Yes. Chief Justice Roberts, may it please the
    court, first, in the Shelby decision, you spoke very powerfully
    about the fact that we all recognize that there still exists
    discrimination in voting, and you felt that Congress had not,
    quote, done its job. Since then, Congress has been very keen
    looking at what are, in fact, the modern-day conditions that
    exist between the States and among the States when it comes to
    voter accessibility and voter fairness.
        What we know at this point, in this eight years that have
    occurred since 2011, is that the States that were previously
    covered by preclearance have, in fact, had some of the worst
    records for, not only poll closures, but for purges, that
    literally millions of voters have been affected by that, that
    those voters deserve the coverage and the protection of our
    laws of our country to not have to be subjected to that voter
    denial before they are able to have their votes counted
    properly. That what you also have in the--you have told this
    Congress to come up with a new set of coverage formula, and
    that coverage formula is designed to look at those violations
    that are the most extreme, that deny the most voters their
    rights to participate.
        Since your directive to Congress, we have held hearings, we
    have compiled and looked at reports of what is happening in the
    States. We are able to come up with a formula that captures for
    preclearance the States that are engaging in the worst
    activities. But at the same time, we also have recognized that
    in this modern era, we have to come up with some additional new
    standards, that we just can't look at voter turnout anymore, we
    can't look at some of the old original casting back standards.
    That instead, that what we need to look at now is to make sure
    that there are better notice provisions, to make sure that on a
    national scale, as you were concerned, that States are able to
    be held accountable. We believe we have done our job and that
    you should uphold our new legislation.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you very much.
        Ms. Lieberman.
        Ms. Lieberman. Chief Justice Roberts, I agree with
    everything my fellow panelists have said, and, you know, the
    writing is on the wall here. I mean, in the first year after
    the Shelby decision came down, 73 percent of the previously
    covered jurisdictions introduced restrictive voting laws. New
    restrictive voting laws have been introduced in 25 States since
    2010, right? And we have seen, through the stories of
    individuals, that Shelby has emboldened, not just the former
    preclearance States, but States around the country, to continue
    to make voting harder, more confusing, more onerous, and more
    burdensome.
        But not only that, not only did Shelby open the door to
    discriminatory practices that would have been halted at the
    outset under preclearance, but it has also made it more
    difficult to challenge those laws, unduly placing the burden on
    already underrepresented voters of color and their advocates.
        So since Shelby, without the law's stopgaps, the
    evidentiary burdens and the costs associated with these
    challenges has fallen even more heavily on the very impacted
    communities that these laws are designed to protect, to
    challenge denials of their fundamental right to vote. And so it
    is very clear that that is simply not tenable. It is not
    working.
        Congress has the opportunity right now before it, with H.R.
    4, to implement Federal voting protections, to place the burden
    where it should be, on the backs of the government agencies
    that are seeking to implement new restrictive voting changes,
    to show that they are not discriminatory.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Well, I think you all can represent me
    anytime. I thank you all so much for being here, and I thank
    you for your testimony. Thank you so much.
        Ms. Arnwine. Thank you very much.
        Chairwoman Fudge. The other panel I don't think has arrived
    yet, right? Okay. They are on their way over.
        Thank you all again very, very much.
        [Recess.]
        Chairwoman Fudge. I hope you all didn't run, but I am glad
    you are here so we can get started.
        Mr. Yang. Well, thank you for waiting.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Absolutely. And since you are our last
    panel, we just know that you all are going to bring it, so we
    can just wrap this up and close up strong.
        Let me just introduce our panelists we have. John Yang, is
    the president and Executive Director of Asian Americans
    Advancing Justice. At Advancing Justice, Mr. Yang leads the
    organization's efforts to fight for civil rights and empower
    Asian Americans to create more just America for all through
    public policy advocacy, education, and litigation. His
    extensive legal background enables Advancing Justice to address
    systemic policies, programs, and legislative attempts to
    discriminate against and marginalize Asian Americans and
    Pacific Islanders and other minority communities.
        Arturo Vargas. Mr. Vargas is the Chief Executive Officer of
    the National Association of Latino Elected Officials, a
    membership organization of Latino policymakers and their
    supporters, governed by a 35-member board of directors. Mr.
    Vargas also serves as CEO of NALEO Educational Fund, an
    affiliated national nonprofit organization that strengthens
    American democracy by promoting the full participation of
    Latinos in civic life.
        Mr. Saenz is the President and General Counsel of the
    Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, better
    known as MALDEF, where he leads the civil rights organization's
    offices in pursuing litigation, policy advocacy, and community
    education to promote the civil rights of Latinos living in the
    United States. Mr. Saenz rejoined MALDEF in August 2009, after
    spending 4 years as counsel to the Mayor of Los Angeles. Mr.
    Saenz previously spent 12 years at MALDEF, practicing civil
    rights law.
        Welcome, sir.
        And last but not least, Michelle Bishop is the disability
    advocacy specialist for voting rights at the National
    Disability Rights Network, where she is responsible for
    coordinating voting rights initiatives in every U.S. State,
    district, and territory, as well as providing training and
    technical assistance to NDRN's nationwide network regarding
    voting rights and access for voters with disabilities under the
    Help America Vote Act. Ms. Bishop also works in coalition with
    the civil rights community in Washington, D.C., to ensure
    strong Federal policy regarding voting rights and election
    administration.
        I thank you all for being here. And as you know, the
    lighting system, as you have probably just seen it, when you
    begin speaking, the green light will come on. You will have
    five minutes. At one minute remaining, you will see the yellow
    light come on, and then you will see the red light on, which is
    going to indicate that you need to try to wrap up your
    testimony.
        Mr. Yang, you are recognized for five minutes.

     STATEMENTS OF JOHN C. YANG, PRESIDENT AND EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR,
        ASIAN AMERICANS ADVANCING JUSTICE; ARTURO VARGAS, CHIEF
       EXECUTIVE OFFICER, NALEO EDUCATIONAL FUND; THOMAS SAENZ,
      PRESIDENT AND GENERAL COUNSEL, MALDEF; AND MICHELLE BISHOP,
      VOTING RIGHTS SPECIALIST, NATIONAL DISABILITY RIGHTS NETWORK

                       STATEMENT OF JOHN C. YANG

        Mr. Yang. Thank you very much.
        Thank you very much, Chairwoman Fudge. And let me first
    start by offering my condolences for the loss of Representative
    Cummings. As a civil rights organization that seeks to advance
    the civil and human rights of Asian Americans and to promote a
    fair and just society for all Americans, Representative
    Cummings was certainly a champion for so many of our issues,
    and his loss is going to be a loss, obviously not just for this
    Congress, but for the entire Nation.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Mr. Yang. I really appreciate having--inviting us to
    testify here today on language access and the importance of
    this to Asian Americans in particular.
        While the Voting Rights Act of 1965 has been--helps to
    ensure language access and assistance to Asian Americans, it is
    only one piece of the puzzle that we need to look at when
    making sure that Asian Americans are represented.
        I think it is important to start off by recognizing the
    Asian American community. The Asian American community is the
    fastest growing community in the United States. Between the
    2000 Decennial Census and the 2010 Decennial Census, the Asian
    American community has grown by 46 percent. Today, we represent
    about 22.6 million in the United States, which is a little bit
    over 6 percent of the American population.
        With respect to voting, we have also increased dramatically
    in numbers over the years. Between the 2012 election and the
    2016 election, we have increased by over 1 million voters.
        It is also important to note that Asian Americans are not
    monolithic. Certainly, there are numerous Asian Americans in
    urban centers throughout the country, but our fastest growing
    populations are in Nevada, Arizona, North Carolina, and
    Georgia. And so the needs of Asian Americans oftentimes are
    very diverse.
        With respect to language access, we represent over a
    hundred different languages from 60 different Asian
    ethnicities. So ensuring that Asian Americans have information
    in the language that they understand best is always a
    challenge. And, unfortunately, language minority voters are
    often denied much of the needed federally required assistance
    at the public level and face numerous barriers at the polls.
        First, problems can arise when poll workers do not fully
    understand voting rights laws. Poll workers have oftentimes,
    unfortunately, been hostile to people that are not similar to
    their own backgrounds or have language access issues. Asian
    American voters are certainly not immune from those issues.
    When you look at some of the experiences that Asian American
    voters have had, oftentimes they are challenged with respect to
    their identification, whether they are a citizen or whether
    they belong at the polls.
        I will be relatively brief and just offer some
    recommendations with respect to what can be done to help with
    respect to language assistance. With respect to language
    assistance, one of the things that we can do is to make sure
    that translated materials are available, accessible, and
    effective in conducting a comprehensive review of election
    materials to make sure that they really identify materials that
    go to the needed communities, that we use certified
    translators, that we use certified translation vendors to
    ensure that those translations are community oriented and using
    community-based organizations as well to ensure that they speak
    in a language--not only in a legal language that is
    appropriate, but in a community-based language and culture that
    is appropriate.
        With respect to the actual polls and taking protections
    that are necessary, one of the things also is making sure that
    you have assistance under section 208 of the Voting Rights Act
    to ensure that people are allowed the assister of their choice.
    Now, election officials should provide bilingual poll workers
    with separate training on language assistance, some of which
    should be done in their covered languages. But regardless of
    whether jurisdictions are covered under section 203, every poll
    worker should be trained to understand the needs of a language
    minority voter. How the poll worker can best assist that voter
    and having maybe role-playing exercises to ensure that, not
    only English-speaking poll workers, as well as language poll
    workers, can really provide the assistance that they need. They
    know how to handle situations as they arise.
        Certainly, the Election Assistance Commission can provide a
    role in that, providing perhaps a funding infrastructure that
    would allow for assistance, allow for best practices, to
    provide some of these exercises that I have described.
        Certainly, jurisdictions have also, on a voluntary basis,
    provided language assistance, provided translated materials. We
    have seen that in Fairfax County, where even though technically
    it was not covered by Section 203, Fairfax County decided to
    offer language assistance to both a Korean-speaking population
    that fell short of section 203 coverage, as well as providing
    it to a Vietnamese-speaking population. These are the types of
    things that can be done on a voluntary basis, but certainly are
    very, very effective for our community.
        Language barriers certainly remain for the Asian American
    community, and it is a fast-growing community. It is a
    community that is going to be transitioning to U.S.-born Asian
    Americans in a relatively short matter of time, that will also
    translate into more voters, people that want to be engaged in
    the electoral process. So I would ask this Committee to
    consider all of the different ways in which that language
    assistance can be provided.
        Thank you very much.
        [The statement of Mr. Yang follows:]

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        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Mr. Vargas, you are recognized for 5 minutes.

                       STATEMENT OF ARTURO VARGAS

        Mr. Vargas. Thank you, Chairwoman Fudge, Representative
    Aguilar. Thank you for the opportunity to be here today, and we
    join in mourning the passing of Representative Elijah Cummings.
        This organization recognizes that in spite of the
    guarantees that all Americans must have the same right to vote,
    our Nation has not yet attained the goal of full and equal
    participation in our democracy. In the past and the present,
    policies have been adopted that disenfranchise Latino and other
    underrepresented voters, sometimes on the basis of their
    linguistic abilities.
        Linguistic accessibility has long been, and remains, a
    fundamentally important grantor of Latino voters' equal access
    to the ballot. A substantial number of Latinos eligible to vote
    are not yet fully fluent in English, and their ability to cast
    an informed, successful vote depends on their access to
    understandable materials and to persons providing assistance
    with whom they can communicate.
        According to 2018 ACS one-year data, nearly 22 million
    adult U.S. citizens speak Spanish, and approximately 6.3
    million of them are not fluent in English. Americans who are
    not yet fluent in English register and vote at lower rates
    because of the legacy of many decades of intentional efforts to
    exclude voters on the basis of their linguistic ability or
    perceived national origin, as well as ongoing negligence in
    administering language assistance and inattention to
    discouraging effects of some election administration
    procedures.
        Although millions of potential Latino voters enjoy the
    presumed access to multilingual election information and
    materials and to Spanish-speaking poll workers, many are still
    indisputably underserved. Just during the 2018 election cycle,
    reports to the Election Protection coalition hotline, including
    our hotline, the VE-Y-VOTA hotline, which receives calls from
    voters in English and Spanish, included incidences of Spanish-
    speaking voters in jurisdictions with large speaking
    populations, including in Southern California, that they were
    not able to request or choose Spanish language ballots. And
    significant number of our callers had unmet need for live
    language assistance in locations, including Warren County, New
    Jersey, and Prince William County, Virginia.
        Many jurisdictions have implemented sweeping and error-
    fraught methods of identifying potentially ineligible voters
    among those registered, which disproportionately inhibit
    language minority voters' participation in elections. For
    example, since 2010, a number of States have compared voter
    registration lists to information in other State and Federal
    databases that are not designed or useful for voting purposes
    and have erroneously singled out voters who are mostly
    naturalized citizens for purging or extraordinary demands for
    documentation.
        The nationwide trend of polling place closures and
    realignments also threaten language minority voters'
    participation.
        To combat these trends, Members of Congress should mandate
    the use of inclusive, administrative practices in Federal
    elections and incentivize election administrators to take
    proactive steps to better serve language minority voters. Best
    practices to ensure election accessibility for which Congress
    could provide--by which Congress could provide financial
    support, include regular consultation with community
    institutions and leaders who represent language minority
    communities.
        And I will add, this has been a very effective practice in
    the past for those of us who provide naturalization assistance
    services. We used to have a very healthy partnership with the
    USCIS, and troubleshoot with them on how to better meet the
    needs of legal permanent residents applying for U.S.
    citizenship. The same concept could be applied to working with
    local leaders in identifying best practices for making sure
    voting is accessible to all.
        There should be regular training for all employees on the
    importance and contours of measures to ensure linguistic
    accessibility and adaptation of administrative practices to
    account for and avoid disparate negative impact on language
    minority voters.
        Given the countervailing influence of an administration
    that is inclined to reduce or neglect language accessibility
    mandates, organization and congressional advocates of
    accessibility must be prepared to defend the basic necessity
    and utility of providing language assistance for our elections.
    As the number of Americans with diverse national origins and
    linguistic abilities grow, our effectiveness in engaging those
    citizens as active voters will increasingly determine the
    health of our democracy and the credibility of our government
    as a product of a truly representative political process.
        Thank you.
        [The statement of Mr. Vargas follows:]

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        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Mr. Saenz, you are recognized for 5 minutes.

                       STATEMENT OF THOMAS SAENZ

        Mr. Saenz. Thank you, Madam Chair and members of the
    Subcommittee.
        As president and general counsel of MALDEF, I lead a set of
    lawyers across the country who are regularly confronting
    barriers to access for Latino voters. Those barriers both occur
    at the polling place and in structures, including election
    structures, that prevent the Latino vote from having the effect
    that it would have. But today, I want to focus on a looming new
    challenge to the Latino community that seems to target
    naturalized citizen voters, and that grows out of this
    administration's campaign that puts `Americans first or'
    citizens first, though that framework seems to leave out
    naturalized citizens.
        We first saw this in the attempt to add a citizenship
    question to Census 2020. In doing so, the administration was
    clearly seeking to trigger a massive undercount of the Latino
    community, and the first effect of that massive undercount
    would be on voting rights. It would have resulted in
    underrepresentation of the Latino community, both in
    reapportionment, redistributing the seats in the House of
    Representatives among the States, and within each State in
    redistricting congressional seats, as well as State legislative
    and local legislative seats as well.
        As we know, the Supreme Court, in an improbable victory,
    prevented the citizenship question from going on Census 2020,
    but the administration's campaign continues to impact and
    prevent naturalized Latino voters from participating. One
    example of this is in the executive order that accompanied the
    decision by the administration to give up attempting to re-add
    a citizenship question to Census 2020.
        In that executive order, the President directed the
    Commerce Department to seek administrative records from both
    Federal and State sources to try to put together a database of
    citizenship around the country. We have now learned, through
    recent media reports, that one of the main mechanisms they will
    use to attempt to identify citizens is DMV records from around
    the country. The problem is, as we recently saw in a case
    litigated by MALDEF and others in Texas, is that DMV databases
    with respect to citizenship are notoriously inaccurate. The
    fact is that someone who goes to the DMV before becoming a
    citizen has no obligation or even any reason to report back to
    the DMV once they have naturalized and become a citizen. They
    would not have any occasion to go back to the DMV until they
    need to renew a driver's license, for example.
        We saw this in Texas where Texas attempted to purge voters
    from the voter rolls, county by county, by directing registrars
    to use faulty DMV data to send notices to those who were not
    citizens when they went to the DMV and tell them that they were
    effectively being accused of being ineligible voters.
    Fortunately, the litigation prevented that from going forward.
    But we now see that the administration is using the same faulty
    databases to create a database of citizens with the intent that
    that then be used where a State or locality might choose to
    test the constitutional limits of one person, one vote, and
    might choose to equalize population among districts based on
    something other than total population. Clearly, that use of
    faulty citizenship data would have a tremendous impact on the
    voting rights of Latinos, and it raises many concerns.
        Accompanying those concerns are the ongoing rhetoric that
    comes from this administration that seems to target every
    Latino person and every immigrant in the country, regardless of
    whether that immigrant has naturalized or not. We are concerned
    that this ongoing rhetoric, including the invasions of privacy
    in using and accessing these inaccurate DMV records, could
    result in further voting rights challenges. We are concerned
    that it could result in unwarranted challenges to someone's
    eligibility to vote by vigilantes who listen to the rhetoric of
    this administration, from the White House and beyond, and
    decide that they are going to challenge particular voters,
    namely, Latino voters, or voters who don't speak English, or
    voters who appear to them to meet Donald Trump's definition of
    who is not an ``American.''
        We see this looming threat to voting rights as potentially
    having application as early as next year, and we are concerned
    that it is a short step from the rhetoric that we hear today,
    to rhetoric that challenges the legal requirement of providing
    language assistance, bilingual assistance, materials in
    languages other than English, to voters. So we are concerned
    that as early as next year's election, we will see
    inappropriate challenges and diminution in providing those
    required materials. We will see challenges to the legitimacy,
    eligibility of voters who are naturalized but do not yet speak
    English, and these are access barriers that are new, and they
    are created entirely by the campaign that we see on a daily
    basis from the Trump Administration.
        We think that this is a looming danger of voting rights
    concern that this Committee--that this Subcommittee should take
    up and address.
        Thank you.
        [The statement of Mr. Saenz follows:]

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        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Ms. Bishop, you are recognized for five minutes.

                      STATEMENT OF MICHELLE BISHOP

        Ms. Bishop. Chairwoman Fudge, Ranking Member Davis, Members
    of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify
    today. And may I also thank Congressman Cummings, thank you so
    much for your service to this country, and rest in peace, sir.
        My name is Michelle Bishop, and I am the voting rights
    specialist for the National Disability Rights Network. NDRN is
    the nonprofit membership organization for the federally
    mandated Protection and Advocacy, or P&A network.
        According to the Census Bureau, up to 56.7 million
    Americans live with a disability, totaling approximately 19
    percent of the noninstitutionalized U.S. population. The
    Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Pew Research
    Center believe that number is actually closer to 25 percent, or
    one in four Americans. Further, Rutgers University projected
    35.4 million eligible voters with disabilities, or one-sixth of
    the total American electorate in 2016, and we are politically
    active. Pew reports that people with disabilities are more
    likely to pay attention to Presidential elections and to
    believe that the results matter.
        Despite all of this, America's electoral system has a long
    history of excluding people with disabilities. Let's start with
    the obvious: polling places. The U.S. Government Accountability
    Office found in 2000 that only 16 percent of polling places had
    an accessible path of travel, 27 percent in 2008, and 40
    percent in 2016. Forty percent being the all-time high means
    that less than half of polling places were accessible during
    the 2016 election.
        As polling places are very slowly becoming more accessible,
    the voting stations within them are actually becoming less so.
    In 2008, 54 percent of voting booths were accessible. In 2016,
    only 35 percent. Architectural access and voting station access
    combined, only 17 percent of polling places were found to be
    fully accessible. America's polling places are inexcusably,
    woefully, and unjustly out of compliance with the Americans
    with Disabilities Act.
        As if this weren't enough, the Leadership Conference on
    Civil and Human Rights recently found that 13 States closed an
    overwhelming 1,688 polling places in just 6 years, and
    uncovered an alarming trend: falsely blaming polling closures
    on the ADA. Jurisdictions offered lack of ADA compliance as a
    pretext for closures, despite their admitted lack of
    understanding of the ADA, failure to provide ADA surveys of the
    polling places in question, and grossly inflated cost estimates
    for updating polling places.
        Disability rights advocates and the Department of Justice
    do not advocate for the closure of inaccessible polling places.
    Rather, we allow for temporary, same-day modifications,
    curbside voting as a stopgap measure, and other low-cost best
    practices. In a forthcoming report, NDRN examines the issue of
    polling place closures, ADA compliance, and DOJ enforcement in
    more depth.
        Our report finds that voting jurisdictions that settled
    with the DOJ in the last several years are overwhelmingly not
    closing their polling places. Alternatively, jurisdictions that
    closed or attempted to close significant percentage of their
    polling places typically were not investigated by the DOJ,
    could not provide accessibility surveys, and could not provide
    any evidence of coordination with their State's P&A or other
    disability advocacy organizations. The ADA and DOJ's
    enforcement of it are undeniably being used as a smoke screen
    for voter suppression.
        These barriers have real consequences. Despite the size of
    the disability community and our demonstrated investment in
    elections, people with disabilities continue to vote at a lower
    rate than our nondisabled peers. In 2018, that difference in
    turnout was around 4.7 percent, 6 percent in 2016, and 5.7
    percent in 2012, small percentages that actually equal several
    million voters.
        Immediately preceding passage of the Help America Vote Act,
    the gap in voter participation was actually closer to 20
    percent. The data shows a clear narrowing of the voter
    participation gap since HAVA's passage made voting drastically
    more accessible for people with disabilities.
        To protect the right to vote for all Americans, Congress
    must first and foremost pass the Voting Rights Advancement Act.
    A fully restored Voting Rights Act would prevent questionable
    polling place closures that threaten access to the vote heading
    into the 2020 Presidential election.
        Additionally, congressional funding is sorely needed to
    ensure that elections officials can continually acquire,
    maintain, and improve their polling locations and equipment.
    The territorial government and P&A of the Northern Mariana
    Islands, as well as the Native American Disability Law Center,
    a P&A, also need HAVA funding to ensure access to the vote for
    Pacific Islanders and Native Americans with disabilities.
    Extending funding to the only two P&As excluded from HAVA is a
    simple and no-cost legislative fix.
        Finally, each of the patchwork of Federal laws that ensures
    America's electoral system are accessible to all eligible
    voters must be enforced to their full capacity. America's
    democracy is only as strong as its ability to hear the voices
    of all Americans.
        Thank you.
        [The statement of Ms. Bishop follows:]

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        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you. Thank you very much.
        Mr. Aguilar, you are recognized for five minutes.
        Mr. Aguilar. Thank you, Madam Chair.
        Mr. Yang, if I could start with you, and then kind of work
    our way down to Mr. Vargas and Mr. Saenz as well. And then, Ms.
    Bishop, I have something, a separate question for you.
        You know, we talked about language assistance, and
    obviously there are best practices that seem pretty reasonable,
    you know, ballots in multiple languages. What are some other
    things that we can do? You mentioned poll worker training. What
    are some other ideas that we can do within the language-
    assistance frame that we could invest in and support in order
    to make a difference and ensure that people have access to the
    ballot?
        Mr. Yang. Well, I think poll worker training, if I could
    expand on that a little bit, it is really developing training
    modules, because sort of sometimes when people think of poll
    worker training, they are thinking about making sure that they
    have translators or people that speak multiple languages that
    are serving as poll workers, and that is certainly one
    component of it. But the other component is just making sure
    that people that speak English that are working there, that
    still can recognize a situation as it develops and know how to
    handle it.
        For example, if I am accompanying my mother to a polling
    station, then the fact that my mother doesn't speak English
    well, that poll worker has to understand that I am there to
    help and that that is within her right as a voter. And,
    unfortunately, there are a lot of poll workers, not through--
    and I am going to be generous here--not through any intent to
    discriminate, but do not understand the laws well enough. And
    so it is really having an infrastructure that has that
    learning--those learning modules in place.
        Some of it is also, again, very, very simple. I am going to
    think about low-hanging fruit, is just having translations in
    trifolds that are sitting on counters that sort of make people
    feel comfortable, that say, oh, I can have an assister of my
    choice here. Oh, there are translated ballots, or there are
    translated materials available. People, citizens, especially
    new immigrants, oftentimes do not understand their rights. And
    so just making them comfortable with the process.
        Certainly, for my organization and speaking, I think, for
    all immigrants, just as you are no less of a citizen because
    you have a disability, you are no less of a citizen because
    English is not your first language. And so our job is to find
    ways to make sure that people feel like they are equal citizens
    in democracy.
        Mr. Aguilar. Thank you.
        Mr. Vargas.
        Mr. Vargas. Congressman, the fact is that there are many
    jurisdictions that get it right, and they have been providing
    language assistance to voters for years. And what we are
    concerned about is those places around the country that are
    newly being required to provide language assistance for the
    first time, and there is no need to really re-create the wheel
    if they can adopt best practices from other jurisdictions. And
    that is, I think, something that Congress could incentivize.
        You know, how could a manual of best practices be provided
    to other jurisdictions who for the first time are being
    required to provide language assistance. So they don't repeat
    the same mistakes that have been committed before, and they
    provide the best access to voters who are newly covered under
    section 203.
        Mr. Aguilar. Thank you.
        Mr. Saenz. And like Mr. Vargas, I would focus on the fact
    that the jurisdictions that are covered by section 203 are
    regularly expanding, and I think we need to find a way to
    anticipate, which is not difficult, where the expansion will
    occur and begin working with those jurisdictions to connect
    them with successful jurisdictions in their own State or where
    they may be the first in a State, with those in other States.
        I also think there is a broader effort about really
    educating the public about folks' rights, so that they
    understand that this is not illegitimate. You don't then have
    vigilante volunteers or others who would add their views that
    nothing like non-English assistance should be being provided.
    So I think there is a broader education effort that should
    start with where we know the next set of jurisdictions to be
    covered will be.
        Mr. Aguilar. Thank you, Mr. Saenz.
        Ms. Bishop, I wanted to talk a little bit about, in your
    testimony, you talked about the Help America Vote Act and the
    participation gap among those voters with and without
    disabilities. You know, how has HAVA helped close the gap? You
    mentioned it was closer to 20 percent and then went down to,
    oh, below five. Can you talk a little bit about that?
        Ms. Bishop. Absolutely.
        Prior to the Help America Vote Act, we were doing even less
    to make America's elections accessible to all--in fact,
    profoundly little. I am sure all of us in the room remember
    voting on punch card systems. Those are not only difficult for
    the average American to line up properly and use but virtually
    impossible for people with certain types of disabilities.
        Many American voters with disabilities voted privately and
    independently for the very first time after HAVA was passed.
    And that includes Americans who began voting when they were 18
    and weren't able to vote with privacy and independence until
    they were in their 60s and 70s, who spent their entire lives
    having to have somebody else mark their ballot for them because
    that ballot was not accessible.
        In itself, the privacy and independence of your ballot
    should be a right. It is also a security feature of our
    elections, that I can trust--because I marked my ballot
    independently--that it has been marked in the way that I
    intend, rather than having to take a leap of faith as a voter
    who, potentially, is blind having to ask someone else to mark a
    ballot that I will never be able to see and know that someone
    marked the ballot the way that I intended.
        And so it was a longstanding failure, I believe, of our
    electoral process, that we were not providing accessibility of
    the ballot to voters with disabilities.
        Accessibility of polling places itself is a new issue. The
    Americans with Disabilities Act is the gold standard in making
    sure that polling places are accessible. It did not become law
    until 1990. There is one law that predates that that was passed
    in the early 1980s, the Voting Accessibility for the Elderly
    and Handicapped Act, but that still was the early 1980s. Prior
    to that, we were doing virtually nothing to make sure that the
    electoral process was accessible to Americans with
    disabilities.
        So HAVA represents an enormous leap forward in making sure
    that everyone is able to cast their ballots, and we absolutely
    believe that is a major factor in closing that gap, absolutely.
    If your electoral process is not accessible to you, that is
    sending a message that you are not welcome and that your vote
    does not matter.
        Mr. Aguilar. Thank you.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Ms. Bishop, let me just--I don't even know where to begin.
    I mean, we know the law. We know ADA exists. We know HAVA
    exists. What is their rationale for not complying with the law?
    This is what I am trying to figure out.
        Ms. Bishop. There are many. There are many reasons.
        We hear very often--I work a lot with State and local
    elections officials, as do the organizations that are in our
    network, the P&As. We hear very often that it is difficult to
    find polling places that are compliant with the Americans with
    Disabilities Act.
        They are not entirely wrong about that. Compliance with the
    ADA overall is lacking. There are not that many locations that
    are fully compliant. And they also have to be willing to serve
    as a polling place, which is voluntary. We hear that often.
        We hear that finding polling places that are suitably
    located, as well, and a large enough number of them.
        We also get accounts of poll workers who are not adequately
    trained and ready to interact with voters with disabilities
    when they come into the polling place. So they are not
    necessarily aware of all of the accommodations they are
    required to provide.
        There is a widespread failure in the United States to
    really fully understand all the provisions of the Americans
    with Disabilities Act--in particular, how they apply to
    elections.
        I consider it primarily an enforcement issue. And that is
    why we believe the Voting Rights Advancement Act is so
    important. The Department of Justice and organizations like the
    P&As have to be able to go out and push for that enforcement
    and that compliance with the ADA without the threat that the
    response will be to close large numbers of polling places. We
    don't make polling places accessible by closing them. We make
    them accessible by making them accessible.
        But without the protections of preclearance in the Voting
    Rights Act, our job becomes extensively more difficult.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        And to any of the gentlemen: I listened to each of you say
    that education and education of poll workers, et cetera, was
    extremely important. Who do you believe is responsible for that
    education and that outreach?
        Mr. Vargas. Well, clearly, the election officials at the
    local level are responsible for that. And they should be held
    accountable to make sure that they provide that education for
    all the poll workers they employ.
        We also know that many of them are challenged in finding
    enough poll workers with the language ability necessary to meet
    the needs in local communities.
        So I think one of the areas where Congress could be helpful
    is to provide more incentives, to provide--to identify and help
    local elections officials recruit and train poll workers with
    the language abilities needed to help the voters in their
    jurisdictions.
        Chairwoman Fudge. So, now, let me just ask this question,
    since you are the CEO of NALEO. Do you all not, at points, just
    recommend to the local boards of elections, ``We have these
    people who are willing to serve on election day or whatever to
    get trained; these are people who can accommodate the issues
    that we have''? Do you make those recommendations and they just
    don't accept them, or how does that work?
        Mr. Vargas. We certainly do. And we also try to identify
    other strategies to expand the number of people who are
    eligible to be a poll worker. And, remember, for some folks,
    they have to give up a day of work.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Sure.
        Mr. Vargas. And that is not something that people are able
    to do, many times, if they are working folks, to give up a full
    day's work and not get compensated by their employers.
        Which is one of the reasons why we supported legislation in
    California to allow high school students to be able to work as
    poll workers. Even though they, themselves, may not have the
    right to vote yet, they did have the skill sets in order to
    help people through the voting process.
        So there are other incentives and strategies that can be
    employed to do that.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Mr. Saenz, let me go back to this
    discussion about naturalized citizens. A citizen is a citizen.
    So what is it about our process that would single out someone
    that is a naturalized citizen?
        Mr. Saenz. So, because naturalized citizens are, of course,
    immigrants themselves, they have families that include folks
    who are still immigrants. They may still feel that they have
    vulnerabilities that they had as immigrants.
        So, when you are confronted with rhetoric, as we see daily
    from the Trump Administration, that seems to discourage
    participation of immigrants in all elements of governance,
    there is no way that naturalized citizens are naturally immune
    from that. So there is a deterrent effect.
        Chairwoman Fudge. So you said they don't go at all. They
    don't even get to the point where they get to the polls.
        Mr. Saenz. In some cases, they would be deterred. They
    would have fears about their families. In other cases, they
    would be concerned that they, themselves, might be challenged,
    particularly if they are a citizen but a citizen who needs
    language assistance and language assistance in some way at the
    polling place.
        But there is also, of course, this danger of accessing
    inaccurate data. Even though it is going to be used in
    aggregate, it still means that a naturalized citizen is aware
    that the Federal Government is seeking information from their
    State DMV that may inaccurately identify them as still a
    noncitizen. That, too, can have a deterrent effect, or it can
    encourage others, who may be led by the rhetoric, to challenge
    that person's participation in elections.
        So it all stems from practices and rhetoric from the
    administration that is not seeking accurate data, particularly
    with respect to naturalized citizens, that is invading privacy,
    that is raising those kinds of concerns, and that is
    diminishing the citizenship, if you will, of those who are not
    native-born citizens of this country.
        Mr. Yang. If I could add just very briefly to that, I think
    that is exactly right.
        With respect to the Asian-American community, about two-
    thirds of our community are immigrants, and over 90 percent, 92
    percent of the Asian community are immigrants or children of
    immigrants. So, although, obviously, our community is
    naturalizing at a very quick, fast rate, the traditional
    trajectory is that there are going to be noncitizens within
    each of those households. So what Tom is saying is exactly
    right. It is within that household these fears that are being
    raised about what it means to be a noncitizen.
        And we are not even talking about undocumented immigrants
    here. We are talking about legal, permanent residents that have
    every right to be here. For their children that may be of
    voting age, there are certain fears that are invoked about how
    much they want to put their family that includes all sorts of
    different types of immigrants into that public eye.
        Chairwoman Fudge. So what do you think that we can do to
    combat that?
        Mr. Saenz. Well, I think there has to be a counter-
    rhetoric, if you will, that can come from the Congress that can
    also help elected officials who want to make sure that there is
    widespread knowledge that everyone, including naturalized
    citizens, has every right to vote.
        By the same token, I think that this Subcommittee should
    seriously look at whether there should be limits on the
    accessing of data known to be inaccurate to determine
    citizenship population, which is what is ongoing right now with
    the Commerce Department.
        Now, MALDEF, together with Asian Americans Advancing
    Justice and others, have challenged that effort in court. But
    there also needs to be additional efforts to prevent accessing
    private data that is knowingly inaccurate and attempting to
    somehow say that is an indication of who are citizens and where
    our citizens are in the country.
        Chairwoman Fudge. You are challenging under what kind of an
    action?
        Mr. Saenz. So we have filed in Federal court in Maryland,
    challenging the Executive Order that involves accessing these
    administrative records under a number of claims, including the
    Administrative Procedure Act, but also including constitutional
    claims, that the same unconstitutional racial discriminatory
    intent that motivated the addition of the citizenship question,
    or the attempted addition of the citizenship question, is
    behind this effort as well.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Okay.
        Mr. Aguilar, do you have anything else you want to----
        Mr. Aguilar. No, I am good.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Okay.
        The last thing I want to ask you--and if you could just do
    it quickly--is, if there is one thing that you think we can
    have an effect on or one thing you want us to do, from this
    Committee's perspective, that will make the situation better
    that you are experiencing, what would that one thing be?
        Why don't we start with Ms. Bishop.
        Ms. Bishop. Just one?
        Chairwoman Fudge. Just one. Your number one.
        Mr. Aguilar. Not all of our witnesses have answered the
    question with just one, so just----
        Chairwoman Fudge. Your number one.
        Ms. Bishop. I am trying to choose amongst so many things.
        I think that one of the most important things that Congress
    can do to support making elections fully accessible to all is
    to provide funding. States need funding to upgrade their
    equipment, to upgrade their polling locations. The P&A network
    needs additional funding to do the work that we do to push them
    forward.
        But I think we also--one of the things I have not yet
    mentioned today is research and development funding to support
    better solutions.
        I mentioned earlier that, for the first time, many
    Americans with disabilities were able to vote privately and
    independently because of the Help America Vote Act. All of the
    voting systems we are using today could be both more accessible
    and more secure. We need effective research and development to
    develop better solutions that will solve both of those
    problems.
        Elections equipment is not a big-money industry if you work
    in tech. If Congress is able to support those efforts, I do
    believe that we could develop voting solutions that are both
    more accessible and more secure, going forward.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Mr. Saenz.
        Mr. Saenz. I would cite what I just said, which is looking
    into this accessing of State databases that are known to be
    inaccurate. Because even accessing the data, as we saw with the
    short-lived election fraud task force, can have chilling
    effects on voters.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        Mr. Vargas.
        Mr. Vargas. I would say a fully seated, staffed, and funded
    Election Assistance Commission.
        Mr. Yang. I would ditto all of that.
        And I guess I can't overstate promoting best practices and,
    through that, education and transparency. It is those best
    practices, making sure that the State, especially all of you,
    have connections to local and State elected officials, local
    State representatives, make sure they understand this.
        And holding them accountable. Now, obviously, there--what I
    mean by ``holding them accountable,'' it doesn't necessarily
    mean, sort of, through the elected representative, but making
    sure that they understand the consequences of this. Because,
    again, what we are here trying to do is represent the American
    people.
        Chairwoman Fudge. Thank you.
        And I thank you all. This has been a very interesting day,
    just to understand the myriad of things that are happening
    across this country that make it more difficult for people to
    vote. I thank you for the work you do. I thank you for taking
    the time to come to testify today. And I hope that you will
    continue to fight the good fight.
        Because, obviously, there are certain things we can do and
    certain things we cannot. But I appreciate your sharing with us
    what you are seeing on a daily basis, and it gives us some idea
    of what we can do as we look at legislation going forward.
        Again, I thank you all so much for being here.
        And, without objection, this Subcommittee stands adjourned.
        [Whereupon, at 1:27 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]

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