Personally I say yes, every single person should be issued a voter ID card when they turn 18 or become a citizen, to vote you must produce it, to apply for a renewal or replacement you must quote its' reference number and the same to apply for postal voting.
Absolutely!!! Now let's sit back and wait for Comedy Central to show up and complain of the evils of asking people to prove who they say they are to vote.....funny how it's required for so many things in life yet nary a peep about the "injustice" of those.
I believe there should be some type of identification. I don't think it should be something that a person has to 'obtain' like go somewhere to get or request by going to www. - - - -. There's a group of people that aren't able, perhaps physically or financially to apply somewhere for a special i.d. card. I would require i.d. like a drivers license, voter i.d. card, medicare card, perhaps a copy of a utility bill.
I think it should be mandatory and I also think we should insure that the government provides them free of charge to all eligible citizens.
It's not so much whether or not we should have voter ID. It's more so what is considered a valid ID to vote.
I support the idea of voter id as long as a valid ID is available for free to anyone that already does not have an accepted form of voter ID and the process to get the photo ID is NOT prohibitive. Your idea of a national photo ID for voting purposes that you proposed would be FAIRER since every American citizen would get one free when you turn 18 and it would force every American citizen even with a DL or some other form of photo ID to go through the same process to get the official voter ID so no one can argue it is racist or discriminatory since every American would face the same inconvenience to get one. There are a few arguments left like some older black Americans do not have a birth certificate or other documentation but those can probably be treated on a case by case bases and time will eventually eliminate the problem. The main problem with this idea is COST. A national program like this will always be expensive. You will have to hire tons of people nation wide to man the facilities and process the request. There is also the printing and shipping cost of all the cards and the logistics of maintaining the database. Since there will be no fee charged for the ID the entire cost will be paid by tax payers. Where will the money for this program come from? Increased taxes? Cutting cost? Is there a point when the cost for this program out-weighs the gains. With little evidence for mass voter fraud is it worth spending hundreds of millions for this program? Will programs like this cause its own problems? Since 100s of millions of these cards will be mailed out will scammers try to intercept them and essentially cause a voter fraud problem?
I have a super color printer and some lamination sleeves... By your standard, I can be anyone.. right?
Financial institutions have the ability to look someone up by name, verify their identity with their SSN, verify if they have died, verify their current address and verify if they have any other accounts with them in seconds. It isn’t unreasonable to think the Government shouldn’t be able to do the same thing.
Idaho accepts our drivers license because to get that, we had to produce our Birth Certificate. Also military records are accepted.
Do you mean states owe us them for free? I got mine during the driver license routine. CA also accepted my drivers license though illegals also get drivers licenses in CA.
One of the main points many folks make about id laws is that they are meant to disenfranchise those that have a harder time getting forms of ID. In my way of thinking we just remove that talking point and give everyone id. Yes there is a cost there but to insure fair and free elections it is a minor one. I would also make election day a national holiday, one with as much pomp and ceremony as possible. I want people to think about our Republic and voting as a joyous and important act. I want parades, party's, and celebration to coincide with voting. In the end I want as many eligible Americans to vote as possible.
What bothers me a hell of a lot about voting for presidents is that in the first place I nor the millions of us voting know much about any candidate. This is why the mudslinging campaign against Trump by the media worked as the Media intended it to. Supposedly the media is trustworthy. Take the crap about the Russians. Who authorized the report that came out against Trump on Jan 6, 2017? That was very high level. Obama as the then president had that high level authority to blame Trump for Russians efforts. So the media ran with it to destroy Trump. Do the same to Biden and see how he likes it. Trump could have released a high level indictment on Biden but did not. So the public has no reliable sources to evaluate any president candidate. But there are experts who can do just that. We call them electors. A way to see it is the aggravation factor of voting. We do not vote for the Supreme Court. I do not want to do that. This country made a mistake changing to public elections for presidents. A tragic mistake.
It's curious you haven't got voter ID cards in US. Now, from an Italian perspective we find curious also that you haven't got an Identity Card, but this is a different matter.
I already have one. Been using it for about 48 years. It's called a drivers license. Has everything on it, including a picture of me. I also register to vote every time I move from one place to another. It's called doing due diligence. Freedom does require a teensy bit of effort on ones part.
And it doesn't even have to be a 'Drivers License'. There are ID's not related to driving, for those who don't or can't. But they to require that wee bit of effort that it seems some are not willing to expend.
People who aren't willing to exercise that "wee bit of effort" would most likely not care about voting anyway. So the very concept of exclusion then is simply a political ploy to discourage running maintenance or tuning up the voting process, as no one is negatively effected by basic sensible requirements.
Why wait until 18... when we get social security numbers when we're an infant? Just register them to vote then.
It's a point I have brought up multiple times. The assumption that someone is being 'oppressed' based on the fact they have not voted, without knowledge of WHY they have not voted. If people were truly concerned based on people not having ID, then instead of trying to change the method of voting, how about assisting those who want an ID for voting and other purposes to get them?
Do people remain in the same town or state as where they are born? What political affiliation would they be registered as? Would that registration be reflected as active for 18 years before they could cast a vote? How could they verify who they were when it came time for them to actually be eligible to vote?
Are you asking for baby's first political party toys too? 1. No, they move around so have this on the national level. 2. Independent. 3. No. Why would a baby be voting? 4. How does anyone with photo ID do the same? I could have your social security card and say "hey look at me, I'm Collateral Damage". In person voter fraud doesn't exist.
I fully support voter ID. I do not support a national ID for voting. I don't want a national election. I am happy with the EC and prefer to keep the elections at a state level. I'm happy to leave these decisions with the states. Once we have a national election, the need for the EC is gone. Democrats would almost always win. Blech.
