Friday Interview: Photo ID for Voters

Today, Carolina Journal Radio’s Donna Martinez discusses Indiana’s contested photo-ID-for-voters law and the possible impact on North Carolina with Daren Bakst, legal and regulatory policy analyst for the John Locke Foundation. (Go here to find a station near you or to learn about the weekly CJ Radio podcast.)

Martinez: Daren, when I moved to North Carolina, the first time I voted and I got out my driver’s license and was ready to show it to the person at the poll and they said, “Oh, you don’t need that,” I was kind of taken aback. No photo ID required here.

Bakst: No, and actually I think most people kind of do presume that you have to show an ID. I thought you had to show ID until relatively recently. And the truth is, this exists in a lot of states, where you don’t have to show identification — photo ID.

Martinez: Interesting. If you want to try to cash a check or do a whole lot of other things, you have to show all sorts of ID.

Bakst: Rent a video? Yes.

Martinez: Rent a video. Exactly.

Bakst: Voting? No.

Martinez: It just seems ripe for mischief. Does the data show that?

Bakst: Well, honestly, it is a little unclear what the data shows in terms of voter [fraud] — and the claim would be that that there is voter fraud — and there is not a lot of evidence that there is rampant voter fraud that exists. But my argument to that is, you are not going to know that there is rampant voter fraud because it is hard to identify the fraud. It’s kind of like Medicaid fraud. The government has a hard time detecting it. So, what they have to do is find individuals — sometimes that money may be part of the fraud to kind of tip off the government. So we have in the law, we have provisions where somebody, a private actor, can actually sue on behalf of the government and, in essence, collect some of the money that is recovered for the government. So it is way to kind of detect fraud. The truth is, you just don’t know whether or not it is going on. But, yes, voter fraud does exist, and the Department of Justice has convicted people for voter fraud. And just to give an example of how easy it is to commit fraud, I think a lot of people think that fraud is simply going into a poll and pretending to be somebody else.

Martinez: Yeah, that’s what I think of.

Bakst: Right. But you know what? You could actually commit fraud by registering under somebody else’s name — just come up with a name, register for the first time in the state under a fake name. The Board of Elections will send, will verify your mailing address. Big deal. So let’s say you do live where you say you live. You go to the poll for the first time, all you have to show is a utility bill. And you just say you are that fake name — Donna Martinez [for example] — you can vote. So that’s pretty easy.

Martinez: There are a lot of people that could do this.

Bakst: And there [are] no cameras at polls or anything. It’s pretty difficult to figure out what’s really going on.

Martinez: Interesting.

Bakst: So the argument about that there is not enough fraud so, therefore, we don’t need to worry about this issue, I think is absurd. There is no way you really would have rampant evidence of voter fraud in the first place, in my opinion.

Martinez: Daren, a case has made its way all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, and this involves Indiana’s photo ID law. What is the basis to the challenge of the Indiana law?

Bakst: Well, like other voter ID laws, opponents to these laws think that it disproportionately disenfranchises certain groups like minorities, elderly, the poor — basically it is another poll tax.

Martinez: Harkens back to those days when there really was discrimination.

Bakst: Absolutely. The problem, though, with that argument is the Indiana law, along with some of these other states that have these laws, Indiana has exceptions for people — like it doesn’t apply to anybody who lives in a nursing home. You can get a free ID. So that is not an issue. If you don’t have an ID with you at the poll, you still can vote. You just have to, after the fact, show the ID. Or, if you don’t have enough money or you are indigent, you just fill out a form swearing, attesting to the fact that you are indigent. So you still can vote. So it’s not like the fact that you don’t have enough money is going to keep you from voting. You’ll still be able to. It does create — it makes it slightly more difficult in the sense that you have to have an ID. That is the extent of it.

Martinez: Well, Daren, there is bipartisan support for the ID, or for the idea of photo IDs. In fact, there was a 2005 commission that essentially concluded that. Tell us about that commission and who was on it.

Bakst: It was a bipartisan federal commission on election reform, and one of the issues was whether or not photo IDs should have to be shown at polls, and they said yes. It needs to be — they should be shown. And to show how bipartisan it was, President Jimmy Carter supported this recommendation. So you have President Carter and [former Reagan administration] Secretary of State James Baker that were leading the commission. So it is a bipartisan argument.

Martinez: And it is kind of interesting, I think, Daren, because former President Jimmy Carter has in his retirement almost made a name for himself, so to speak, for traveling around the world to different countries that are having elections and being there to oversee. Because he is very concerned about the integrity of elections.

Bakst: And that’s what this is all about. And I think that adds — certainly and definitely — legitimacy to the fact that this isn’t a political question. This is a question about integrity of our elections … And we would expect a decision, I think, maybe May or the latest, June.

Martinez: Any predictions on how this will come out?

Bakst: I would expect — it’s hard to predict — but I think it will be a 5 to 4 decision.

Martinez: Another one.

Bakst: Upholding the law. Now I would say that if they don’t uphold this specific Indiana law, that the court will still provide some guidance to states so that we would know what would be constitutional, to kind of lay a foundation for the fact that voter ID laws would be permissible under certain circumstances, but this particular law may not be constitutional.

Martinez: If the Indiana law is upheld as constitutional, what would that mean for North Carolina?

Bakst: Well, I think that anybody who makes the argument that we can’t have this law because it is unconstitutional or something like it, well, that argument goes out the window. It certainly provides ammunition for proponents of voter ID laws, photo ID laws. And it certainly makes it more likely that we will see something in North Carolina.

Martinez: And conversely, if this is overturned as unconstitutional, then it says to North Carolina, “hey, you’ve been right,” essentially.

Bakst: It depends on how the decision is written. I mean, if the Court says, “We don’t like this Indiana law but, yes, it can be done,” then it is still possible to pass a law. I mean, there may be one aspect in the Indiana law — I don’t know what it would be — that they don’t like, but that another state’s law addresses the concern that the Court has.

Martinez: So it might be that there is something in the decision that might be considered by some to be a minor point, that actually might be the guidance that some states are looking for.

Bakst: Absolutely. I kind of expect a blueprint from the Supreme Court on how to make this — how to create a constitutional voter ID law.