Two Latino advocacy groups on Tuesday sued the state of Iowa over a law that prohibits county election officials from using information readily available in the voter registration database to fill in information that’s missing from a voter’s absentee ballot request.
The law pushed through by Republican lawmakers in the final hours of the legislative session last month requires county election officials to contact the voter directly by phone or email. If the voter’s phone number or e-mail address is not available, the election official must mail a letter to the voter requesting the additional information. Supporters of the measure characterized it as a voter fraud protection measure.
The new requirement “makes absentee voting in Iowa more complicated, cumbersome, confusing, expensive, and time-consuming for both voters and election officials, without any adequate justification for doing so,” said the Des Moines-based League of United Latin American Citizens and Washington-based Majority Forward in their lawsuit filed in state court.
The groups challenge laws they believe disenfranchise voters, especially when those laws inordinately affect immigrant populations including Latinos.
Iowa has 130,000 Latino, Black and Asian voters among the more than 2 million registered voters, said Joe Henry, LULAC’s Iowa political director. While the law could make it more difficult to get absentee ballots from all voters, he noted that it’s even harder for those voting for the first time or not as familiar with the absentee balloting process and filling out the request forms.
The groups said voters who are notified too late or not at all will be effectively denied their right to vote safely in the November general election. Some will be forced to choose between their health or their right to vote, as voting in person will be their only remaining option.
The groups are asking a judge to declare that the law violates the Iowa Constitution in addition to issuing an order that would prevent Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate from implementing or enforcing it.
A similar requirement involving four-digit voter verification PIN numbers enacted by rule by the secretary in November 2017 was struck down by the court after a judge found it to be an unjustifiable barrier to the ballot.
More voters are likely to see absentee balloting as an alternative to going to the polls in November because of the coronavirus pandemic, the lawsuit said.
Democratic Rep. Ako Abdul-Samad said many are first-time voters learning how to exercise their right.
“We don’t have the luxury in this day and time and the way the climate is to play games with people’s voting right,” he said. “People fought, people have struggled and people have died so that individuals have the right to have their voices heard.”
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