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McDonnell to announce voting rights restoration changes today in Union Hill
05/29/2013 11:31 AM by John M
NAACP President Benjamin Todd Jealous will be joining Governor Bob McDonnell in Union Hill at Cedar Street Baptist Church this afternoon for an announcement regarding voting rights restoration:
Gov. Bob McDonnell today will announce that he is automatically restoring the voting rights of nonviolent felons on an individual basis.
The sweeping administrative action – while not an instantaneous blanket restoration – is as far as the governor can go within current Virginia law, administration officials said.
The change, effective July 15, removes the application process for nonviolent felons. Once the administration verifies a nonviolent felon has paid his debt to society, the governor will send the individual a letter restoring his rights.
Anyone else find it offensive that the NAACP seems to believe their constituency is the ex-felon population?
While a lot of folks will probably be surprised to see this coming from a Republican governor, from a purely political standpoint it actually makes sense for the GOP. This move actually adds more GOP voters to the rolls (assuming felon registration, party identification and turnout rates are in line with the overall population levels deaveraged by race).
Given the timing, perhaps Bob is trying to break what looks to be a close gubernatorial race for his Attorney General? While a lot of folks gravitate towards to higher conviction rates by race and assume this is an issue that helps get more black voters, they’re ignoring the fact that there are fewer blacks in VA overall and even with the higher percentages, there are fewer black ex-felons than white ex-felons by the numbers.
Again, not sure why the NAACP decided to use political capital here for an issue that dilutes the voting clout of their states constituency. Maybe they thought the C stood for Criminal? Given what a small fraction of the African American population is actually felons, it seems offensive for them to associate the two. Though I guess the NAACP has been pandering to the least common denominator of their base for a while now so it’s not surprising.
Personally I think it’s a horrible move all around. The GOP is doing a pure numbers move to get more folks that will vote for them in the rolls, the NAACP is celebrating the worst of their population instead of the bright spots and we are asking the child molesters, murderers and rapists to help us choose what our society looks like.
“nonviolent felon”
Embezzlers, thieves, arsonists…
To be fair, that’s already how Richmond runs things (convicted bribers still seem to have a great deal more clout than the average citizens) and we have much worse in most of our elected offices (citywide, statewide, nationally) today.
Burn a few houses down, lose your voting rights… Burn an entire country down, you remain president…
Alex, you’re completely off the wall here. Yes, it is true that there are, by population, more white felons than black felons- But doesn’t it occur to you that these people, regardless of race, should be allowed to vote after #1, completing their sentence, #2, paying restitution, #3, completing probation?
As for the NAACP: Do you really think the NAACP, an organization devoted to civil and voting rights, would oppose such a thing?
You’re really off the wall here . . . chill out.
This is a good thing-
Alex,
Maybe vagina Bob is doing this because he already signed the voter ID into law thereby disenfranchising so many blacks in the state. Odd he would choose to announce this at Cedar Street.
@7 – I don’t have any real heartburn with allowing felons to get their voting privileges back. The system today already allows that. It’s just a little bit of work to do so.
I’m mostly questioning why this is a top priority to make it super easy? For example, our politicians don’t give two shits about making the lines at DMV shorter but they are scrambling all over themselves to make it so that people who fucked up have the most seamless voting process possible. It would be nice if they’d give as much concern about the 96% of their citizens who didn’t commit a felony.
I’m also trying to highlight that the only reason why this is a concern to the politicians is that each party seems to think it will benefit them. If the intent is to do something nice for felons, why not pass a law making it so that employers can’t discriminate against them in hiring? Because there’s nothing in it for the politicians that’s why. The GOP was against it until recent changes in party affiliation made this look like a net positive. This isn’t about concern for felons folks. It’s politicking plain and simple and yet another case of our elected officials pandering instead of doing something that benefits the majority of their base.
If a felon cares enough to want to vote and takes the steps to make it happen, no concerns here. I just don’t think we need to be losing sleep that felonious wisdom is underrepresented in our democratic process if they’re too lazy to care.
@8 – two things:
1. Despite what the Free Press would have you believe, there are also more whites without drivers licenses in VA than blacks. Another case of higher percentages of a smaller base.
2. How the fuck does someone function without a driver’s license anyway? Can’t get a job, cash a check, get an apartment. Why not just man up and get one? This whole thing is another red herring by the professional victim crowd to make an issue to rally their base. Instead of having voter registration drives if they’d organize ID drives it would do more good for the people they claim to care so much about. A vote is about as useless as a powerball ticket, an ID opens a lot more doors.
“Why not just man up and get one?”
That’s a really easy thing to say if you can read well enough to study for and pass the test, and have no pressing learning disabilities or memory issues that would make it impossible to remember the answers and mark them correctly on the test.
Alex,
While I agree with you on both issues, why sign into law a bill requiring photo ID when voting when voter fraud is pretty much nonexistent? Should the GA be spending time on other more important issues (like all the jobs they campaigned on)?
Also, I have no idea how anyone lives without a license.
@11 – DMV also offers a photo ID card that serves the same purpose with no testing requirements. An hour standing in line is all it takes. Or folks could spend years whining about voter disenfranchisement. Seems to me there’s an easy out if people really care. This is strictly a drum being beaten by folks who want to rile up voters and tar their opponents as racists.
@12 – why should I lock my car when nobody has broken into it yet? The point isn’t whether or not it has happened, it’s that it could very easily. Are you proposing we wait until someone steals an election before instituting some basic common sense safeguards?
Again, getting an ID is something that folks need anyway to live life. All I’m saying is quit whining about bullshit and go help someone get one today if you think it’s unfair.
I’m not sure it would be possible to conclusively prove whether or not voter fraud exists anyway. How would you measure it? Can you show me those stats?
@11- This is irrelevant since the photo ID card doesn’t require you to pass a test, but if someone can’t understand a driver’s ed manual or can’t remember things long enough to mark the correct answers on a driver’s ed test, what makes you think that they would be well-informed about the relevant political issues or be able to remember who they want to vote for in order to fill out a ballot? When I took the driver’s ed test, it wasn’t rocket science…
It used to take forever to get your rights back after serving your time for non-violent felony. A friend of mine who stole a car when he was 17, served time, learned his lesson, and never again committed a crime had a really hard time. He started the process when he was about 25. It was not completed until he was almost 40. Sadly, he died three years later, only able to vote in one presidential election.
Alex and Mrs. Alex, I am aware of the existence of the photo ID. And I actually looked back through the thread to see if it had been mentioned. It had not. You specifically recommended people “man up” and get a driver’s license — so that is the comment to which I was responding.
Ok, my mistake. I assumed the context clues would give it away but I was a bit sloppy with my language. Man up and get a photo id already. Saying there’s anything discriminatory about this is horseshit is a.) it’s not that hard to meet the id requirements as folks would have you believe and b.) you should have one anyway since basically any transaction you want to commit needs one.
If you’re too lazy to take the time it takes to get one, I seriously doubt you are taking the time to be an informed voter either.
And are we calling liquor stores and bars discriminatory because they won’t sell to these folks either? What about the jobs that won’t hire them? Do we really think that these people would rather vote than have a job? Where’s the outcry for those things to drop id requirements? There is none because this is a manufactured crisis by politicians who only care whether those folks can vote for them, not about actually improving their standard of living. Come around every four years, pander a bit, get the votes and go back to DC.