HARRISBURG, Pa. — The Pennsylvania judge who last month upheld a law requiring voters to show photo identification heard testimony Tuesday from officials on whether the state’s process for implementing the statute will allow people to comply before the general election in November.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Sept. 18 ordered Commonwealth Judge Robert Simpson to consider whether all eligible voters will be able to obtain acceptable ID if the law is upheld. Simpson ruled Aug. 15 that plaintiffs including the American Civil Liberties Union hadn’t proved the law would disenfranchise voters. The state high court asked Simpson to submit a supplemental opinion on the availability of alternate IDs by next Tuesday.
“This is an evolutionary process,” Kurt Myers, deputy secretary for safety administration for Pennsylvania’s Department of Transportation, testified at a hearing in Harrisburg. “We’ve learned through the process and learned ways to make it easier for people to get.”
New relaxed requirements for a voting-only ID card were implemented Tuesday at 71 state transportation centers statewide, Myers said.
The case is among multiple court battles over voting rules in states including Florida, Ohio and Wisconsin, where Republican and Democratic presidential campaigns see the possibility of victory. A state analysis found that the photo requirement might exclude as much as 9 percent of Pennsylvania’s electorate from voting in the presidentialelection.
Attorneys for South Carolina argued Monday for their state’s voter-ID law before a panel of federal judges in Washington.
President Barack Obama carried Pennsylvania, which has 20 of the 270 Electoral College votes needed to win the presidency, by 620,478 votes in 2008, fewer than the number of voters that might be kept from the polls in November, the ACLU and advocacy groups said.
Pennsylvania’s law, enacted in March, requires a voter to present a state-issued ID or an acceptable alternative such as a military ID, to cast a ballot.
Opponents of the law said likely Democratic voters, such as the elderly and the poor, are those least likely to have a valid ID by Election Day. The Department of State, which governs elections, on Aug. 27 began offering new ID cards as a last resort for those unable to obtain valid substitutes.
The state Supreme Court said in its Sept. 18 ruling that the state wasn’t living up to the law’s requirement that it provide “liberal access” to alternative forms of ID. To decide whether the measure can be implemented, moredetails are needed about the availability of the Department of State’s ID, the court held.
The state has issued only 9 percent of the minimum number of IDs it estimates are needed, the ACLU said. About 1,300 Department of State cards have been issued since Aug. 27, Myers testified. That’s in addition to about 9,500 cards issued by the transportation department since March, he said.
The Department of State implemented new procedures for the Department of State card Tuesday, including eliminating the “exhaustion” requirement, allowing voters to apply directly without first seeking a transportation department ID, Myers said. The move cuts the process down to one trip for applicants.
An applicant no longer needs to show two proofs of residency or state a gender, Myers said. The transportation department also streamlined the process for verifying birth records and extended hours at some centers to accommodate ID requests, he said.
The Supreme Court’s ruling “did not find that the requirements of the voter ID statute itself were unconstitutional,” Patrick Cawley, an attorney for the state, said in a court filing.
“Nor did it find that the statute could not be applied in a constitutional manner,” he said. “Instead it remanded to this court, asking that the court evaluate whether the DOS identification card is actually available and is being issued in a manner that comports with the General Assembly’s expressed intentions.”
Simpson’s review comes as some Pennsylvania counties have announced plans to issue voter IDs through county-run nursing homes and colleges, exploiting a provision in the measure.
The law allows Pennsylvania care facilities and accredited colleges and universities to issue identification cards to anyone as long as the cards show an expiration date. Officials in Allegheny County, which includes Pittsburgh, and Montgomery County said last week that they would begin issuing their own ID cards through county-run nursing homes and a community college starting next Monday.
Pennsylvania’s Department of State said it’s discouraging that process because of security risks.
“We believe it’s legal within the law but it brings up security issues with those facilities,” Matt Keeler, a department spokesman, said in a phone interview. “This wasn’t part of the bill’s intent.”
Front Section, Pages 2 on 09/26/2012