Voter ID Bill Veto Expected By North Carolina Gov. Perdue
RALEIGH - Republican-backed legislation requiring North Carolina voters to show picture identification before casting a ballot they know will count was headed Thursday to the desk of Gov. Bev Perdue, who sounds ready to veto the measure that fellow Democrats have called purely partisan.
The House agreed to minor changes to the bill approved Wednesday night by the Senate. The House vote of 62-51 was well short of the margin that would be needed to withstand a veto. Democrats have been critical of GOP efforts to place additional hurdles on voting in a state with history of civil rights restrictions during the Jim Crow era.
"The voter ID is clearly not in a form that the governor can support," Perdue spokeswoman Chrissy Pearson said.
A separate bill was floating around the House floor in the final days of the General Assembly's regular annual session to end straight-ticket voting and same-day voter registration during the early voting period and a return to partisan judicial elections. It was possible measure could be considered Thursday night.
"As a state, and as an elected official herself, she feels that we should encourage voting, not discourage it," Pearson said, adding that the bills are "going in the opposite direction of where we should go."
The legislation requires a person arriving at a precinct to show one of eight forms of photo ID, including a new voter card available for free from county election boards. Without the ID, people still could cast provisional ballots but would have to prove their identity later.
GOP leaders say the bill will discourage voter fraud and ensure that people who come to the polls aren't turned away because someone unlawfully voted using their name. The bill is modeled on laws in Georgia and Indiana that have been upheld by the courts.
"I don't think it's too much to ask of our voters to say and to be able to prove who they are," Sen. Debbie Clary, R-Cleveland, said during Wednesday night debate in the Senate, which approved the restrictions along party lines.
Democrats say voters already face a felony if they vote using someone else's name and point out the problem is rare: The State Board of Elections referred 43 cases of potential fraud to district attorneys in 2008 and 21 in 2010.
Democrats panned the restrictions as part of a concerted nationwide effort by Republicans to discourage voting, especially among older adults and black residents. It comes in advance of an election year in which North Carolina is expected to be a battleground state in the race for the presidency.
"Anything that lessens the ability of a voter in North Carolina to register, to actually vote when they get there ... and to have their vote to count, we hope that (Perdue) will veto it," House Minority Leader Joe Hackney, D-Orange, told reporters shortly after the voter ID bill's passage.
"We need to do all that we can to enfranchise people, and we don't need to try to discourage them from participating in the political process," said Sen. Floyd McKissick, D-Durham.
President Obama won the state's electoral votes by about 14,000 votes in 2008, ending a 32-year winning streak for Republican nominees in North Carolina. About 147,100 active black voters do not have photo ID, according to the election reform group Democracy North Carolina.
The legislature also neared final approval Thursday of a bill that would legalize an established - but currently illegal - practice of placing political yard signs in the rights-of-way of state highways during designated campaign seasons.
The bill also would make it a low-grade misdemeanor to steal or vandalize signs along the road or at intersections.
Working late
The General Assembly was working into the night to attempt to complete most of its work for this year's session.
House and Senate GOP leaders plowed through calendars Thursday that originally contained 116 bills to debate. They're aiming to adjourn early this morning and return in mid-July to consider redistricting and election bills.
