March 29, 2013
The ACLU of Iowa and Iowa LULAC today restarted their lawsuit to stop the Secretary of State from an unreliable process to remove registered voters if they cannot prove their U.S. citizenship within a limited time.
The ACLU of Iowa and the Iowa League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) filed papers in Polk County District court today, renewing their lawsuit against two rules filed by the Iowa Secretary of State Matt Schultz that the groups say wrongly restrict voting by qualified Iowans.
One rule would have allowed unverified challenges to another voter’s qualifications. The Secretary of State eventually voluntarily withdrew that rule. The other rule, which took effect yesterday, allows the Secretary of State to run Iowa’s registered voters through numerous federal databases to attempt to generate a list of non-citizens.
The ACLU and LULAC say that the Secretary of State was never authorized by the Iowa legislature to put his Voter Removal Rule forward, and that it will erroneously deprive qualified citizens in Iowa of their right to vote. The ACLU and LULAC cite problems with running the registered voter lists through the federal SAVE system, as well as a lack of procedural checks to protect voters once they are identified.
http://www.aclu-ia.org/2013/03/29/aclu-of-iowa-restarts-its-voter-suppression-lawsuit-against-the-iowa-secretary-of-state/
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2 Comments
thanks for this diary
I have been meaning to follow up on this issue. This part of the press release is important:
desmoinesdem Sat 30 Mar 5:14 PM
Schultz's rule is obviously discriminatory
He is identifying a particular group of people and requiring them to prove their citizenship. That’s a requirement that does not apply to the rest of us. All we have to do is sign the registration form to affirm that we are citizens.
cocinero Mon 1 Apr 5:04 PM