[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 9]
[House]
[Page 12186]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        DISENFRANCHISING VOTERS

  (Mr. ELLISON asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. ELLISON. Madam Speaker, State legislatures all across the country 
are passing photo ID laws that could strip millions of Americans of 
their right to vote. Students, communities of color, low-income 
individuals, and seniors are particularly at risk of being 
disenfranchised.
  As just one example, in March this year, a World War II veteran in 
Tennessee was denied the right to vote because he did not have an ID 
that matched his assisted living address. In Minnesota, which is 
considering a misguided constitutional amendment on photo ID, 215,000 
registered voters don't have a driver's license or ID card with a 
current address on it; and if it passes, it will disenfranchise all of 
them.
  Why put these hundreds of thousands of voters at risk? Proponents 
claim fraud, but there's not any fraud. Voter fraud is already illegal, 
and the number of confirmed cases is insignificant statistically. There 
are only a tiny number of cases. For this, we're going to disfranchise 
literally millions of people?

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