That prisoners are not allowed to vote, and in some states not even several years after being released, is amazing to me. It's clear to me this is done to prevent blacks, who's part in the prison population is much higher than in the general population, from voting.

@TsahiAsher Your statement is mostly incorrect, Many states had Felony disenfranchisement (long) before black peple where alowed to vote.SO these laws would not stop black votes, because blacks could not vote to begin with.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/… For more information.

@Vladimirverleg It may not have been a factor in the original legislation, but this isn't a single law passed one time, it's an ongoing process that continues today. Claiming racial prejudice cannot be a factor because of the chronology is not supported by the facts.

@barbecue It's an example of systemic racism that has been endemic since at least the Jim Crow era. They can often claim more general purposes, such as preventing voter fraud, but numerous leaks have shown the primary goal of these types of laws.

Not everything has it's roots in racism, there's a lot of stigma toward anyone convicted of a crime, regardless of race. In my experience the "Don't let criminals vote" mentality is far more about a conflict of the upper vs lower classes than race, though obviously there is a considerable overlap in those topics in the USA and race may play into some (unpleasant) peoples reasoning.

@TsahiAsher turns out that clarity is inversely proportional to exposure to facts.

For those wondering how the right to vote can be taken away, the first indication in the Constitution that voting rights can be taken away is in the 14A which was two-pronged - allowing for the disenfranchisement of those who "participat[e] in rebellion" and criminals, which was a nod to existing state legislation. Previously, voting was almost entirely a state matter, which wouldn't be revisited until civil rights acts in the 20th century.

The key points here are these: Case 1: “provisional ballots are used to ensure that voters who […] do not appear on the list for administrative reasons, can still cast their vote” – If you somehow fell off the register in Germany, you would know long before election day, because you would not be sent your voting card and could react. — Case 2: “Ortega […] resubmitted her voter registration, this time indicating she was a citizen.” — In Germany, given the existence of a register of citizens, there is no need for a voter registration and this could only work by clerical error.

The implications of this are pretty creepy. You can literally be sent to prison for being uninformed. Laws like this are generally created so they can be selectively enforced only against undesirables, while ignoring violations by the right kind of people.

@TsahiAsher African Americans are also overwhelmingly Democrats. I'm curious how many of those laws would be repealed in red states if there happened to be a major shift rightward among that demo. Which is not so farfetched: African Americans tend to as a group be more socially conservative, e.g. lower percentage approving of gay marriage. I'm not saying it isn't fueled by racism, but I wouldn't assume that until they kept after it against their own political interests.

I'm a little confused about the first example. If the person used a provisional ballot to attempt to vote, why is that voter fraud? Shouldn't the ballot just be thrown out and the person notified within 10 days, like the text you quoted says?

@TheWanderer because the state criminalised attempting to vote when ineligible

@TheWanderer you have to sign an affidavit where you affirm on penalty of perjury that you meet the listed criteria. As for why that matters, if a candidate wins an election using technically invalid votes there really isn't a good way to go back and say oops sorry, we're giving to the other guy/gal because enough people who voted for you did so invalidly.

Also a provisional vote seems like a bad name for something that's basically a normal vote but you're just not on the registration list for some reason.

I think you're probably right on the name: those "provisional" ballots very much count as valid votes for the election. I think the idea is that if there aren't some pretty steep penalties for abuse then they'll get abused "I just voted for the sixth time today!".

...now whether or not they should have actually pressed the case against the people voting when they shouldn't out of ignorance is another question. Legally, they certainly had every right too but the prosecution of crimes is discretional.