Why is showing your ID to vote such an issue?

[JEDIYoda]

They are usually illegals or poor people who can't afford a driver's license.

That has to be the most assinine statement of 2012.....

 

[Humpy]

How is that possible? I know of no place that allows in-person voting anywhere other than your assigned polling location.

Albuquerque / Bernalillo County allowed voters to use any of the available locations. It makes a lot of sense to allow people to vote where it is most convenient.

http://www.abqjournal.com/main/2012/11/05/politics/144042.html

 

[JustMe21]

How about in states where people are required by law to have a government issued photo ID? Since people are supposed to have it anyway, why not require it as a form of validation?

 

[dank69]

Don't you need to be a citizen of the United States to have these rights?

You're comfortable giving the government the power to force you to obtain a government provided ID in order to qualify as a citizen?

 

[MetalMat]

You're comfortable giving the government the power to force you to obtain a government provided ID in order to qualify as a citizen?

They already do, but I guess in your perfect world everybody just gets along and nobody lies.

 

[torpid]

Except no one is asking anyone to spend $200 for an ID, not ever and not monthly. The vast majority of Americans have ID already, so that they can drive or cash their paychecks. Inconveniencing the few that don't already have one is not a good reason not to require ID to vote.

You are asking the government to spend money on the free IDs and the new enforcement rules for IDs. And provisional ballot enforcement. It is not free to taxpayers to implement it. With most states severely crunched, it is quite costly a measure to them.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

But then you'll be using the mail to commit a crime and the postmaster general will come after you....

Correct. There is a SYSTEM in place to prevent voter fraud for mail in voting. Yes the state of CA publishes when they release most of their ballots, and it's kinda ridiculous. You could go burglarize all those mailboxes.

So mail in voting is very susceptible to fraud because the barrier is low. But at least there's a barrier. Some states make you mail in a copy of your ID or something. I remember having to do that in 2004.

Which brings me back to the idea that instead of mail in voting, online voting could be better. Perhaps require two factor authentication or something as an ID check. The easy barrier to breach privacy with mail in voting shows that online voting isn't any worse.