As the presidential candidates continue to duke it out in Wisconsin, a smaller battle will be waged in court this Friday, and its outcome may make it harder for some Wisconsin voters to cast their ballot come Election Day.
Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen filed a lawsuit against Wisconsin's Government Accountability Board last Wednesday demanding election clerks verify the identities of voters registered since Jan. 1, 2006. After this date, Wisconsin was required by the Help America Vote Act to cross-check the identity of those registering to vote to ensure eligibility.
Wisconsin election officials did not get the cross-checking software, however, until Aug. 6 of this year.
Due to this delay, hundreds of thousands of voters who have registered have not been cross-checked. The Justice Department put this number at 240,000 people, while the Government Accountability Board said it was closer to 1 million.
Van Hollen said that in order to prevent voter fraud, it is important these individuals be checked. He stated that every unlawful vote disenfranchises those entitled to vote.""
However, Van Hollen must also balance this concern with the consequences the daunting. complicated and potentially chaotic charge of attempting to verify this many individuals in such a short period of time presents.
President of the Wisconsin Municipal Clerks Association Nancy Zastrow said the cross-checking software has kinks that declare an individual ineligible if, for example, they did not put a middle initial on their voter registration form but have one on their driver's license.
Eligible voters who registered may go to the polls to find themselves ineligible. Wisconsin law allows voters to register on Election Day, but groups such as students and the homeless may find it hard to produce necessary information, like proof of address, which is needed to do so. Working men and women who only have time to vote during their lunch hour may also have trouble voting if they have to wait to register.
Although Van Hollen's intentions are respectable - voter fraud is a threat to democracy - he must also be realistic about what the state's election clerks can accomplish before Nov. 4. His actions are intended to protect the tenets of a fair election, but they may also hinder legally registered voters through unintentional means.
In this tight of an election it is important that every eligible voter be allowed to cast their ballot. Though voter fraud should be a concern, this concern is negated if the process used to detect it leads to greater disenfranchisement. The greatest failure of the Wisconsin government this November will be if it blames voters, instead of itself, for its mistakes in running elections.
