Supported by the Priorities USA Foundation, LULAC of Iowa and an Iowa State Student File Lawsuit Against Iowa’s Recent Voting Law
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 30, 2018
Supported by the Priorities USA Foundation, LULAC of Iowa and an Iowa State Student File Lawsuit Against Iowa’s Recent Voting Law
Washington, DC — Today, the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) of Iowa and an Iowa State student, supported by the Priorities USA Foundation, filed suit in the Iowa District Court for Polk County against Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate, requesting that the court restrain him from enforcing recent changes to the state’s voting law and declare that these changes violate the Iowa Constitution.
HF 516, a bill signed into law last year, has brought about a series of changes and regulations that serve only to complicate the voting process and that will have disproportionate impact on racial and ethnic minority voters, younger voters, elderly voters, women voters and voters with disabilities. The specific provisions the complaint challenges include:
- Voter ID requirements: Beginning in 2019, voters will be required to present one of a narrow list of approved forms of identification in order to cast a ballot. Notably, most young voters will not be permitted to use their student ID card as a valid form of identification. Although the law is not yet in effect, Secretary Pate is overseeing a “soft rollout” of the law during the 2018 elections, for which the public outreach has been highly misleading and could easily leave Iowans with the mistaken impression that they cannot vote this year without an acceptable form of ID.
- Changes to absentee voting: The window for absentee voting has been significantly shortened and applications for absentee voting now require voters to include an obscure identification number.
- Signature matching requirements: Untrained poll workers will now be relied upon to match voters’ signatures at various points in the voting process—which experts have warned is extremely unreliable, will lead to longer lines at the polls, and will result in eligible voters having their ballots rejected because of false positives.
- Elimination of straight-party voting: Voters will no longer be able to opt for the ease of straight-party voting, which at least one-third of Iowa voters used in 2014 and 2016. Historically, minority voters in the state have chosen the straight-party option in even higher proportions.
“Under Secretary Pate’s leadership, Iowa is engaged in an active effort to restrict the right to vote for countless individuals who wish only to participate in the democratic process,” said Guy Cecil, Chairman of the Priorities USA Foundation. “HF 516 includes a series of targeted attempts at complicating voting, and it’s clear that the law violates long-cherished protections enshrined in the Iowa Constitution. The Priorities USA Foundation is proud to support this lawsuit and will monitor future developments in the state.”
The Priorities USA Foundation is committed to protecting the right to vote for every American. The Foundation is also supporting a lawsuit in Florida challenging the state’s practice of prohibiting the use of public college and university campuses as early voting locations, and the Foundation supported lawsuits filed in 2017 against voter suppressive laws in New Hampshire and Indiana.