Current Events > Now THIS is clever; using ADA noncompliance to suppress minority voters

(+) Yeah! (+)

This might have already been covered since I know this story about voter suppression has been going around. I hadn't seen this component of it before, though

https://thinkprogress.org/ada-voter-suppression-cd7031080bfd/

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The racial implications of the closures have generated significant attention. The county is over 61 percent black, and one of the polling locations that would be shuttered serves a precinct where more than 95 percent of voters are African American. Had the U.S. Supreme Court not gutted the Voting Rights Act in 2013, the closures would most likely have been blocked by the Department of Justice.

But the method the county is using to justify the closures has generated less attention. Republican lawmakers and election administrators in Randolph County are not the first to use the federal Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), intended to protect the nations disabled communities, as a pretext to disenfranchise minority voters.

Under President Trump, the federal government has been employing the same strategy. Jim Tucker, an attorney and member of the Native American Voting Rights Coalition, said he learned earlier this year that the Department of Justices Disability Rights Section is targeting at least three largely Native American counties, where facilities used as polling locations often lack paved parking lots, designated handicapped parking spots, entrance ramps, wide doorways, and other ADA-required features. In several counties, the Justice Department has threatened enforcement actions if local governments do not either spend large sums of money to modernize polling locations or shutter them altogether.

Its very troubling that this same pretext is now being used to target polling places used by other racial and ethnic minority groups.

Its a diabolical move: citing one civil rights statute (the ADA) as the justification for violating another (the VRA), Tucker, who previously worked in the DOJs Voting Section, told ThinkProgress. These sorts of closures can effectively disenfranchise entire communities of voters, all under the false guise of purportedly seeking to make polling places accessible for the disabled.

The jurisdictions the Justice Department has targeted point to the larger goal of suppressing non-white voters. Under President Trump, the department has settled at least five enforcement actions in counties across the country where polling locations do not meet the stringent requirements of the ADA. Four of the five locations targeted by the Justice Department Chicago, Ill.; Chesapeake, Va.; Coconino County, Ariz.; and Richland County, S.C. have significant minority populations.
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If only we had some law designed to prevent stuff like this. Some sort of voting rights act...

It's like an 80s teen-movie villain.

Here is an idea, maybe make sure these places are up to code.
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In a mirror universe 0Gorlab is reporting on how Republicans are suppressing votes by having polling stations at places that aren't ADA compliant so the handicapped can't vote.

Like... voter suppression is bad, but at what point can you make the case that these places actually need to be ADA compliant? Is it okay if people in wheelchairs can't vote in that county? If this were a week before polls that'd be one thing, but it's August. Are you telling me these places can't install a ramp between now and then? Or better yet, just find a place that IS compliant.
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s0nicfan posted...

Like... voter suppression is bad, but at what point can you make the case that these places actually need to be ADA compliant? Is it okay if people in wheelchairs can't vote in that county? If this were a week before polls that'd be one thing, but it's August. Are you telling me these places can't install a ramp between now and then? Or better yet, just find a place that IS compliant.

The especially suspicious part is shutting them down between the primaries and general.

s0nicfan posted...

In a mirror universe 0Gorlab is reporting on how Republicans are suppressing votes by having polling stations at places that aren't ADA compliant so the handicapped can't vote.

Like... voter suppression is bad, but at what point can you make the case that these places actually need to be ADA compliant? Is it okay if people in wheelchairs can't vote in that county? If this were a week before polls that'd be one thing, but it's August. Are you telling me these places can't install a ramp between now and then? Or better yet, just find a place that IS compliant.

Is this the right time? The answer is no. Its not. The reason its not the right time? Its never the right time, Malone said, responding to concerns that the closures are coming so close to an important election. When a county resident asked if he would be open to finding other ADA-compliant polling locations, Malone said that he was not hired to find alternatives.

so... yeah
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Balrog0 posted...

s0nicfan posted...

In a mirror universe 0Gorlab is reporting on how Republicans are suppressing votes by having polling stations at places that aren't ADA compliant so the handicapped can't vote.

Like... voter suppression is bad, but at what point can you make the case that these places actually need to be ADA compliant? Is it okay if people in wheelchairs can't vote in that county? If this were a week before polls that'd be one thing, but it's August. Are you telling me these places can't install a ramp between now and then? Or better yet, just find a place that IS compliant.

Is this the right time? The answer is no. Its not. The reason its not the right time? Its never the right time, Malone said, responding to concerns that the closures are coming so close to an important election. When a county resident asked if he would be open to finding other ADA-compliant polling locations, Malone said that he was not hired to find alternatives.

so... yeah

Editors note: The original published version of this story mischaracterized the Justice Departments ADA enforcement effort in polling stations as a Trump administration initiative to suppress voters of color. Thats not the full story. After publication, officials from DOJ as well as activists in targeted counties reached out to tell ThinkProgress their interpretation and experiences with the program differed in some jurisdictions, they told us, the program was working to increase minority voter participation. This story has been updated to reflect those other views, and to correct a factual error.

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These are the positive additions that have been made

But Rokey W. Suleman II, the director of elections in Richland County, S.C., said the DOJs program to enforce the ADA has had positive consequences in his county...

But Suleman said that reaching a settlement took years, but the work was initiated under the Obama administration.

Suleman said that DOJ attorneys also visited his polling locations in Richland County, and he felt the effort had positive outcomes in his county. But Tucker said he sees the ADA enforcement actions being used to suppress Native voters.

So, how does this help your point or rebut mine, @s0nicfan?
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Here's another way the Trump administration itself has responded without closing non-ADA compliant polling places:

Shortly before the 2016 election, the DOJ sent representatives to visit Navajo Nation chapter houses that serve as polling locations in Coconino County and found that almost none were ADA-compliant. The Trump DOJ took on the work and Coconino County eventually settled instead of closing any of its polls, agreeing to provide an accessible voting program, including a program that is accessible to persons with mobility or vision disabilities and accessible polling places at accessible sites, according to settlement documents.

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Balrog0 posted...

These are the positive additions that have been made

But Rokey W. Suleman II, the director of elections in Richland County, S.C., said the DOJs program to enforce the ADA has had positive consequences in his county...

But Suleman said that reaching a settlement took years, but the work was initiated under the Obama administration.

Suleman said that DOJ attorneys also visited his polling locations in Richland County, and he felt the effort had positive outcomes in his county. But Tucker said he sees the ADA enforcement actions being used to suppress Native voters.

So, how does this help your point or rebut mine, @s0nicfan?

I'm not sure. If fixing these things takes literal years, then it will ALWAYS interfere with either a primary, midterm, or general election. If that's the case, I'd rather they be dealing with it now during midterms than during a general when more people actually bother to go out and vote. I don't know how close the race is in those states, but if it's one of those areas where one candidate is polling at like 80+% then this could be a big nothing.

The bigger issue, and the one that more likely supports your argument here, is that the guy claims ADA noncompliance but there wasn't any sort of official government public report made, so it's more likely that he just looked and said "no ramp, not compliant". But again... is this in a district where it even matters?

But like I said... no suppression is good. I just don't see how you'd ever get a polling site to be ADA compliant (which they should be) without getting in the way of something given the timelines you're highlighting.

EDIT: Also, unless I'm severely mis-reading your second post, it sounds like the Trump administration actually went out of their way to find an ADA compliant solution whereas this guy isn't. In that light, it makes the Trump DOJ look good and this particular local government body look bad.
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s0nicfan posted...

EDIT: Also, unless I'm severely mis-reading your second post, it sounds like the Trump administration actually went out of their way to find an ADA compliant solution whereas this guy isn't. In that light, it makes the Trump DOJ look good and this particular local government body look bad.

yeah it definitely sounds more like Georgia than the federal government

he also just got fired apparently btw

https://tinyurl.com/yakyvvyd
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Balrog0 posted...

s0nicfan posted...

EDIT: Also, unless I'm severely mis-reading your second post, it sounds like the Trump administration actually went out of their way to find an ADA compliant solution whereas this guy isn't. In that light, it makes the Trump DOJ look good and this particular local government body look bad.

yeah it definitely sounds more like Georgia than the federal government

he also just got fired apparently btw

https://tinyurl.com/yakyvvyd

Justice served, I guess?
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