Having Your Cake

It appears Governor McCrory does like to share cake with some people. He chose not to share cake with me, but in his effort to diss and dismiss me by calling my request to meet with him ridiculous and calling me a prop for liberal groups, he actually made even more people aware of my efforts to restore pre-registration for teenagers.

The United States Justice Department is bringing a lawsuit on North Carolina because of the 56 page voting bill Governor McCrory signed into law. McCrory commented on this lawsuit by citing how President Obama  himself had to present an ID when he voted early in Chicago and how he feels the Justice Department disagrees with majority of North Carolinians who think showing an ID when you vote is a good idea.

Once again, a 12 year old girl has to point out obvious things that the Governor of North Carolina seems to miss. What the Justice Department is challenging here is not a simple voter ID law. The Justice Department is challenging this law because it is overly restrictive as far as the type of ID that can be used and doesn't offer enough protections for voters who do not have ID. There are also three other parts of this law that the Justice Department is challenging. The new voting law in NC cut back on the number of early voting days. It eliminated same-day registration. It also stopped the counting of provisional ballots from people who went to the wrong polling place by accident.

The Department of Justice can't do anything about the elimination of pre-registration for teenagers in NC. However I, unlike the Governor, been doing a lot of reading on this topic. A recent report by the Commission on Youth Voting and Civic Knowledge (a non-partisan organization) recommends that we, "align states’ high school civics curricula with voting reforms that encourage pre-registration in schools." I encourage all my readers who care about youth engagement in democracy to read the entire report here: http://www.civicyouth.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/CIRCLE-youthvoting-individualPages.pdf

This voter ID law is much more than a voter ID law and if McCrory is going to defend the law, he needs to defend the whole thing. Own it, Governor, and if and when you do own it, you need to tell us why. If you want to have your cake at our expense, Governor, you should be prepared to eat it when 2016 gets here.