Two reports outline solutions for election protection & increasing voter participation.

View this email in your browser ([link removed]) | Forward to a friend ([link removed]) | DONATE ([link removed])
[link removed]

From the Desk of Trevor Potter
Dear John,
I want to provide some details this month about concrete actions that can be taken now to make our electoral process more inclusive and resistant to anti-democracy threats.

These actions come in the form of recommendations from two recent reports that should be of great interest to all who are focused on preserving and strengthening our democracy.

[link removed]

The National Task Force on Election Crises, which includes Campaign Legal Center’s Paul Smith, Adav Noti, and me, released a report, “Lessons from the 2022 General Election: How to Prevent Election Crises, and Emerging Issues for 2023, 2024, and Beyond,” on February 9.


The second report, “Strengthening Democracy: A Progress Report on Federal Agency Action to Promote Access to Voting,” was released in early March by a diverse coalition of advocates, including CLC.

The National Task Force on Election Crises ([link removed])
The Task Force report details more than 20 separate recommendations for ensuring that the progress we saw in 2022 against anti-democracy forces continues into 2024 and beyond. The recommendations flow from an examination of what went right leading up to the midterm elections while embracing a clear-eyed perspective on the work that remains to be done.

The report recommends, among other things, sustaining and expanding access to early voting and vote-by-mail, as well as speeding up the process of vote tabulation where possible through legislation to allow for expanded pre-canvassing of absentee ballots.

Protecting the backbone of our electoral process gets special attention as well, with the report stressing the need to sufficiently fund election administration, including equipment, supplies, security, personnel retention and voter education.

Responding to the need to address the ongoing threat of election-related violence, the report calls for better protections for voters, election workers and officials, including codifying stronger protections for election officials and their families into the law. The report also calls for poll workers to be recruited on an ongoing basis.

From the report: “Many election offices have lost seasoned personnel – in part due to threats and harassment – and lack adequate resources to employ best practices across the board. It is not enough to laud the election officials who with great effort deliver in the face of obstacles; we must have their backs, literally in some cases.”

Ensuring that state election codes align with updates to the Electoral Count Act (ECA) is another of the report’s recommendations. This is a top CLC priority. These updates were signed into law last year, a positive development for our democracy. CLC was among the leading organizations working with Congress to update the ECA and published a blog earlier this year ([link removed]) outlining the main implementation steps individual states need to take prior to the 2024 election.

CLC thanks the Task Force for producing a thorough and forward-looking report.

“Strengthening Democracy” Report on Voting Access Executive Order ([link removed])
On March 7, 2021, the 58^th anniversary of the civil rights demonstration that came to be known as Bloody Sunday ([link removed]) , President Biden issued an executive order declaring that: “Executive departments and agencies … should partner with State, local, Tribal, and territorial election officials to protect and promote the exercise of the right to vote, eliminate discrimination and other barriers to voting, and expand access to voter registration and accurate election information.”

This commendable call to action is necessary as more than 63 million eligible Americans were not registered to vote during the last presidential election, many of them people of color.

The report evaluates ten federal agencies on their efforts to comply with the executive order, finding that, while a few have made noteworthy progress, such progress is the exception rather than the norm. This is a shame because the report estimates that pursuing the right strategies at these agencies has the potential to generate an additional 3.5 million voter registration applications each year.

An example of progress cited in the report is the Department of Veterans Affairs working to integrate voter registration opportunities at its health facilities.

In the “still have work to do” category, the Bureau of Prisons is cited for making a strong commitment to providing voter registration services to eligible people in federal prisons but moving slowly toward implementation. CLC is committed to helping those entangled with the criminal justice system gain access to their freedom to vote ([link removed]) and has been communicating with several federal agencies to highlight the steps they can take ([link removed]) to address this issue.

Amongst the three agencies deemed to be “falling behind” is U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, for failing to implement changes that would make it easier for newly naturalized citizens to register to vote.

To learn more about President Biden’s executive order, I recommend reading the report ([link removed]) and a recent blog on the subject ([link removed]) by CLC Law Clerk Kate Uyeda.
Sincerely,

Trevor Potter
President, Campaign Legal Center

Donate ([link removed])

============================================================
** Facebook ([link removed])
** Twitter ([link removed])
** Instagram ([link removed])
** LinkedIn ([link removed])
The nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center is dedicated to advancing democracy through law at the federal, state and local levels, fighting for every American’s rights to responsive government and a fair opportunity to participate in and affect the democratic process.

Copyright © 2023 Campaign Legal Center, All rights reserved.
Our mailing address is:
Campaign Legal Center
1101 14th St NW, Ste 400
Washington, DC xxxxxx
USA
** Unsubscribe from this list ([link removed])