Welcome to the November edition of The Lever — reaching you in the peak of autumn. Our democracy is strongest when everyone has a voice.

Though many incarcerated citizens have the constitutional and statutory right to vote, a number of legal and logistical hurdles make it difficult – and sometimes impossible – for them to cast a ballot. This month, our Hot Policy Take analysis is a deep-dive into the issue of incarcerated voting as an important, and often-overlooked, policy issue.

Later in this email, we present to you a critical new report on the struggles faced by voters returning from incarceration in Wisconsin. We also take a look at early voting in Kentucky, and spotlight the important efforts of our partners at We The Veterans and Secure Families Initiative.

HOT POLICY TAKE

All too often, eligible incarcerated citizens face significant barriers to registering and casting a ballot, from obtaining ballot applications without internet access to complying with states’ ID or notary requirements.

Between 2021 and 2023, nine states and Washington D.C. have enacted 12 laws to improve voting access for those who are incarcerated – including four new laws enacted this year alone.

In this month’s Hot Policy Take, we examine the landscape of incarcerated voting, highlighting specific challenges faced by incarcerated would-be voters, and state efforts to address them.

BY THE NUMBERS

260,375

That’s (unofficially) how many voters cast ballots using early in-person no excuse voting in Kentucky’s 2023 election – just under 20% of all ballots cast for all races. While this figure remains unofficial pending the certification of election results, it indicates an upward trend in voters making use of new early voting laws in the Commonwealth.

WHAT WE'RE READING

Building a vibrant, inclusive, and multi-racial democracy is about more than just smooth administration of elections and enshrining the right to vote in law – it’s also about removing barriers that prevent eligible voters from fully exercising their rights. A new report from our friends at Black Leaders Organizing for Communities (BLOC) in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in partnership with the Center for Popular Democracy (CPD), exposes how racism, policing, and incarceration impact the community in the North Side of Milwaukee, where a large share of Wisconsin’s Black residents live, and their ability to participate in our democracy.

Through a series of community interviews, BLOC and CPD paint a vivid picture of how this community struggles to be free, even after returning home.

“I never thought about going to vote due to all the things that were going on [with my health, housing, and jobs]. I felt that no one else was going to help me so I dedicated all my time to getting back to my family and trying to repair all the lost time.”

FROM OUR PARTNERS - We the Veterans & Secure Families Initiative

This month, we observed Veterans Day – honoring the commitment, service and contributions of our nation’s veterans. In recent years, several veterans-focused organizations have formed to help support and strengthen our democracy and we want to highlight the high-impact work of two of them.

In light of growing tensions in today’s political climate, many local boards of elections have been encountering difficulties in retaining poll workers. Recently, We The Veterans started the Vet The Vote project, engaging former service members to serve as poll workers in New Hampshire.

The Secure Families Initiative aids military families in a variety of ways, including providing service members and their families with support with the voting process during station changes and deployments.

THE MARKUP

The Markup is VRL’s weekly legislative update for voting rights insiders. If you’d like to get insights straight to your inbox each Monday, head here to sign up.

Here’s a brief update on what we’re watching this week, and a sneak peek into what you can expect from The Markup each week:

Wisconsin bill removing voters from the permanent mail voter list goes to the governor. Last week, the Wisconsin state Senate passed A.B. 494, a bill that would specify limitations on eligibility for the permanent mail voter list - including that an epidemic of a communicable disease is not a basis, remove all voters who joined the list between March and November of 2020, impose new application requirements for the permanent mail voter list, and create a new related crime, sending the bill to Governor Tony Evers to sign or veto. Advocates in the disability rights community have expressed concerns about the bill.

Federal ballot tracking bill reintroduced. A bipartisan group of U.S. Representatives re-introduced the Vote by Mail Tracking Act, which would require states to print barcodes on mail ballot return envelopes that could be used by voters to track whether their ballot was delivered. Electronic ballot tracking is currently available in all but two states, although officials are only required to provide this service in 15 states and D.C. 

Atlanta-area elections board narrowly votes to certify results of November election results. In DeKalb County - Georgia’s fourth most populous, containing parts of Atlanta and many suburbs - the county board of elections certified November election results in a 3-2 vote, with both Republican appointees voting against certification.

Survey of local election officials finds high turnover, increased workload, and concerns over misinformation. A survey of local election officials conducted by the Elections & Voting Information Center (EVIC) at Reed College found that election official turnover had doubled compared to previous surveys. Officials cited misinformation, stress, a toxic political environment, and increasing workloads - particularly due to records requests - as concerns.