[nativestudies-l] SCOTUS Enables Mass Disenfranchisement of North Dakota's Native Americans

[Kathleen A. Brown-Perez, Esq.]

SUPREME COURT ENABLES MASS DISENFRANCHISEMENT OF NORTH DAKOTA’S NATIVE
AMERICANS

OCTOBER 12, 2018 | 5:00 PM 

By Ashoka Mukpo [1], Staff Reporter, ACLU 
https://www.aclu.org/blog/voting-rights/supreme-court-enables-mass-disenfranchisement-north-dakotas-native-americans


On Tuesday, the Supreme Court chose to stand by and allow the war
against voting to continue. Just a little less than a month before
midterm elections that will determine control of Congress, the court
decided [2] not to block North Dakota's restrictive voter ID law, which
will make it harder for people in that state to cast their ballots. 

Republicans in the state legislature insist that the law is needed to
prevent voter fraud -- despite there being virtually no evidence that
such fraud is a problem. Instead, the real effect of their law will be
to prevent voters whom they fear from going to the polls and having
their say in who represents them. 

The voter ID law [3] was introduced just months after Senator Heidi
Heitkamp, a Democrat, eked out a narrow upset victory in 2012, winning
by less than 3,000 votes. Republican lawmakers responded by passing
restrictive voter ID legislation that all but guaranteed that large
numbers of Native Americans -- who tend to vote Democratic -- wouldn't
be able to participate in the political process. Specifically, the law
requires voters to bring to the polls an ID that displays a "current
residential street address" or other supplemental documentation that
provides proof of such an address. 

This may seem like an innocuous requirement, but in practice, it's
likely to disenfranchise thousands of Native Americans, many of whom
live on reservations in rural areas and don't have street addresses.
Since the U.S. Postal Service doesn't provide residential mail delivery
in remote areas, many members of North Dakota's Native American tribes
list their mailing addresses, like P.O. boxes, on their IDs. And some
also don't have supplemental documentation, like a utility bill or bank
statement, because of homelessness or poverty. Now, because the Supreme
Court refused to block the law, people who show up at their polling
station with a P.O. box on their ID will be turned away. 

The Native American Rights Fund sued North Dakota in early 2016, arguing
that the law was unconstitutional and a violation of the Voting Rights
Act. A federal district judge agreed, issuing a ruling [4] in April that
blocked the ID requirement, but the Court of Appeals for the Eighth
Circuit overturned that ruling in a 2-1 decision in September. The
Supreme Court's denial of the Native American Rights Fund's emergency
appeal means that the law will stand, creating a huge amount of
confusion for thousands of voters whose IDs were valid for the June
primaries but are no longer adequate for them to vote on Nov. 6.  In her
dissent [5], Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg pointed out exactly what's at
stake for North Dakota -- 70,000 residents of the state lack an ID that
qualifies under the new rules. That's nearly 20 percent of the typical
turnout for a midterm election. The ruling, Ginsburg said, "may lead to
voters finding out at the polling place that they cannot vote because
their formerly valid ID is now insufficient." 

In an election that may wind up being decided by just a few thousand
votes, the court's decision could be deeply consequential for the
country, not just those who live in North Dakota. 

There's no reason to look away from the implications of this law: One of
America's major political parties is doing everything it can to restrict
access to the electoral process. This is an attack that must be
confronted for what it is -- a threat to democratic governance that will
have the effect of taking away the most basic right of a large number of
vulnerable voters of color.   

The Supreme Court has repeatedly demonstrated that it won't safeguard
our right to vote, so now it's up to us to make sure we elect
representatives who will. 
-- 
_Kathleen A. Brown-Pérez, MBA/JD_ (Eeyamquittoowauconnuck Indian Nation)


Commonwealth Honors College faculty, University of Massachusetts Amherst


Chair, Five College Native American and Indigenous Studies program 

Links:
------
[1] https://www.aclu.org/bio/ashoka-mukpo
[2]
http://www.scotusblog.com/2018/10/court-stays-out-of-north-dakota-voting-dispute/
[3] https://www.narf.org/nd-voting-rights/
[4]
https://wtop.com/national/2018/04/federal-judge-expands-tribal-id-options-for-north-dakota/
[5]
http://www.scotusblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/18A335-Brakebill-v.-Jaeger.pdf
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