When states put in a voter ID law in a big hurry, one really common problem voters and poll workers encounter is “address mismatch”. This is where your voter registration address does not match the address on your driver’s license (or other photo ID). People generally don’t update the address on their driver’s license until it’s time to renew the driver’s license, which didn’t matter prior to the voter ID law but does matter now. You must fix this mismatch if you hope to vote a first class ballot in Pennsylvania. If you go to the PA site for voter ID info, you will find this, under “person who has recently moved”:
If you have recently moved, keep the following guidelines in mind:
• If you moved from the residence where you are registered to vote to another Pennsylvania residence less than 30 days before an election, you must vote at your former residence. When you arrive to vote, tell the local Election Official of your change of address so that you can vote correctly at your new address in the future.
• After the election, but at least 30 days prior to the next election, change your voter registration by submitting a new Voter Registration Mail Application form. Simply select the box that says ‘Change of Address.’
• If you have moved more than 30 days before an election but did not change your address with Voter Registration Officials, you must vote at the polling place of your old residence, where you are registered to vote. However, you may only vote once at the original polling place and you must abide by special procedures, called “fail-safe voting.” These procedures include:
• If you have moved within the same county, inform the Election Officials at the polling place that you have moved and would like to change your registration by filling out an affirmation that states your new address.
• You will be permitted to vote at the old polling place based on your previous residence, but the County Voter Registration Commission will update its records after the election.
• You will receive a new voter certification card in the mail that will show your new address and polling place.
• You will not be able to vote again at your old polling place (unless, of course, it also serves your new residence).
• If you have moved to a different county in Pennsylvania, you must inform the Election Officials at your old polling place that you have moved to a different county and would like to have your registration changed. The Election Officials will let you vote at the old polling place based on your former residence, but they will require you to complete an affirmation declaring your new address and county of residence. After the election, the respective county voter registration commission will update their records. You will receive by mail a voter certification card from the new county. You cannot vote in your old county again unless you establish a residence there again and re-register to vote.
But that isn’t what you need to know now that Pennsylvania has one of the most restrictive voting laws in the country. You have to go to PennDOT, HERE, and change the address on your driver’s license to match your voter registration address. It’s free, and you may do it online. They will send you a card to take with you to the polls that has the correct address.
So, two steps if you moved since the last election. Update registration address and update photo ID address.
Your goal should be to avoid voting a provisional ballot, because Pennsylvania also has one of the most restrictive provisional ballot processes in the country. If you don’t have ID that perfectly matches your registration on election day, you are of course unlikely to have time to both request and receive ID that perfectly matches your registration within 6 days after the election, and your provisional ballot won’t be counted without it.
After reading this, you now know more about Pennsylvania’s extremely restrictive photo ID law than Governor Corbett does. Yesterday he couldn’t even recite the very short list of acceptable ID.
Dave
Corbett has to be lying. What a bunch of assholes.
Maude
Next, you have to stand on your head for two hours.
Scratch
The PA voter ID law has affected my mom. She needs an ID because she is registered with the initial C (from her birth middle name) for a middle initial and her driver’s license has the middle initial H (from her maiden name). Because of that, she will have to go get one of the voter photo IDs so she can avoid being forced to use a provisional ballot at the precinct where she has voted for over 40 years.
Ash Can
Is it too much to hope for that the DoJ will get this hot mess struck down in time for the election?
Caz
I believe it’s actually the law in most states that if your address changes, you are supposed to go get an updated driver’s license within so many days, like 90 or something, so that it displays your correct current address.
So technically the problem arises when someone fails to follow the law, however petty that law may be or however many people ignore the law.
And do you honestly think that any of that really sounds super restrictive?? All two steps of keeping an address on an official ID updated?
Part of the problem in this country these days is that anything that requires even the slightest effort on the part of the individual, any initiative at all, is construed to be unfair, restrictive, discriminatory. It’s horseshit. If you can’t keep an address on your ID updated in order to vote for president of the freakin’ country, then you’re too lazy and worthless to be voting in the first place.
I mean, honestly, you think any of that sounds difficult and burdensome that it’s better to whine and complain and file lawsuits and cry foul instead of just being an engaged citizen and following the simple, easy rule?
If something isn’t handed to you on a silver platter by the govt, you consider it totally unfair. This entitlement attitude is really becoming a problem. I don’t know how any of you ever hold down a full time job if stuff like keeping an address updated is too difficult for you.
You’re told to keep your address updated and you cry like a baby. Grow up, people! If this is the hardest thing you have to do in order to vote for president it ought to make you proud to be an American.
Do you even know what individual accountability and responsibility are? Seriously, grow the hell up! In grown up world, sometimes you have to take some initiative and get off your ass and do something if you expect to get anywhere in life. It’s like if the govt doesn’t just hand everything to you, you’re lost and you can’t get through life because god forbid you need to keep your address updated.
Pathetic. And you’re gonna complain about me being a troll, and you can’t even figure out how to keep an address updated so you can vote for president, lol. Wow. Glad I am just a troll here! I couldn’t imagine being a full blown BJtard on a daily basis, I wouldn’t be able to take a dump without a govt official coming over to wipe my ass.
Caz
@Ash Can: Well, they didn’t care to pursue militant black panthers wielding nightsticks and intimidating voters at a polling place, so I wouldn’t expect that challenging an “update your address” rule would even register on their radar at all.
But then again, this DOJ doesn’t really prioritize based on the level of criminal conduct – they base their priorities on what best supports Obama and the liberals, and are totally uninterested in enforcing laws.
JPL
@Caz: haha.. At least there are some laws you like.
GA will not allow some to change their address online. Look up the requirements to change your address in person and expect a 4 to 6 hour wait. Not everyone can just take time off of work.
Patricia Kayden
Are the Dems getting the word out to their constituents, as well as challenging these unfair laws? DOJ should block the ID law, but in the meantime, volunteers and Dem organizers need to educate people on how to get proper IDs.
@Caz:
It’s obvious that Rethugs are enacting voter ID laws to help them steal the elections.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EuOT1bRYdK8
djork
Dear Caz,
The reason people act “entitled” to the right to vote is because, well we are. It’s a fucking RIGHT.
Asshat.
RSR
I’ve used that drivers license address update system in PA. Many people have never seen the update card provided by the system. It doesn’t replace your current license, you carry it in addition to your license. I’ve watched people stare at it as if I handed them something in a foreign language.
I have to wonder if many poll workers have seen them, or if it’s yet another item that will just cause ‘confusion and delay.’
Raven
@Caz: You’re a nazi fucking jackass that makes a troll look good.
R-Jud
My parents’ county (Monroe, in NE PA), is still semi-rural and in a lot of places, people didn’t have street addresses, just PO Boxes or vague “Rural Route” addresses. The county recently completed the very onerous task of giving everyone a physical street address. This is good, it’s helpful for the emergency services and delivery guys like FedEx.
What hasn’t been made clear is that if you have a PO Box AND a physical address, for voting purposes your ID needs to state the physical address rather than the PO Box. Dad only found this out when he called to double-check on it. If this applies to you as a PA voter, even outside of Monroe County, you’d best get on it just in case.
geg6
@Ash Can:
I’m more hopeful about the current state trial going on, brought by the ACLU. We don’t have to wait or count on the feds if the state trial goes well. And based on what I’ve been hearing about how it’s going, I’m very hopeful. The ACLU of PA has a great blog about it:
http://www.aclupa.blogspot.com/
jibeaux
Ah yes, the eleventy-fourth amendment, which restricted voting rights for the “lazy and worthless”…it’s amazing how wedded trolls are to their imaginary Constitution, while never bothering to glance at the one that actually exists. It’s pretty good!
@Scratch: That’s beyond idiotic.
JMS
Yes, this is all horrible (I live in PA), but and of course it’s designed to “catch” more Democratic voters than Republican. BUT, it’s so flat out bureaucratically stupid at this point, that it’s no longer just a diabolical plan, but also a confused hot mess. Republicans move. Some of them don’t have ID. Unless there is some secret plan to allow those people through regardless, many of them will be disenfranchised. I hope someone realizes they’ve screwed everyone and just strikes the whole thing down.
RSR
Really, the black panther thing again? Another zombie lie.
Listen, it’s Philadelphia. Intimidation and threats of violence (and actual violence) happen at the Democratic Primary, not the general election. ;)
Actually, I live about eight blocks from the site of that supposed ‘incident.’ It was a big nuthin’ about nuthin’.
geg6
@Caz:
Funny. Your argument would work well for those of us who advocate for gun/ammo registration. How nice that you’d support that, too.
Ash Can
Why is everybody piling on Caz? His comments are doing nothing but reminding me that a nice slice of fruit pie and a fresh, hot cup of joe make for a dandy breakfast. How bad is that?
(Have I mentioned lately how much I love Cleek’s pie filter?)
geg6
@RSR:
Yeah, I can’t get the picture out of my head of that woman chatting on her cell phone behind those guys. She was obviously terrorized as she didn’t seem to even glance their way.
geg6
Oh, and kay? I want to thank you for the license info yesterday. I called PENNDOT back, berated them for not giving me the correct information, and then called the state rep in the next district (can’t call mine; he’s a Turzai lackey) who is fast-tracking it for me. Love him and so wish I could vote for him.
http://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/legis/home/member_information/house_bio.cfm?id=1173
Cassidy
@Raven: I’m guessing he’s one of those worthless, chickenshit assholes we talked about yesterday minus the actual service thing.
Schlemizel
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Carl Nyberg
It seems like changing the rules of the election within a year of the election violates basic fairness.
People participating in the election, e.g. candidates, parties, voters, should have at least a year to know what the rules of the election are going to be.
This late change to the rules seems unfair on its face.
The Ancient Randonneur
The Right Wing Mind at Work:
1. Regulating our corporate masters: BAD.
2. Regulation restricting 2nd Amendment Rights: WORSE.
3. Regulation to make it more difficult for individuals (especially THOSE people) to exercise their Right to Vote: Necessary to protect “ballot integrity”!!!
This message brought to you by the Anti-Abortion/Pro-Death Penalty freedom lovers!
jibeaux
@JMS: Looking through the blog post of geg’s, it seems to me it might get struck down for being a hot mess. It seems to be loaded with vague and undefined terms like “indigent” and “substantial conformity.” And it sounds to me like their researcher has some pretty amazing statistics. 99% of voters think they have ID that will meet the requirements, but only 86% of them actually do — a gap of three quarters of a million voters? That’s astonishing.
fraught
@Caz: You have a real nice day. Keep it real simple. Have a nice cup of mate. Buh-bye.
ET
I wonder if the PA GOPers realize this is just as likely to screw with their voters as it is to screw with Democratic voters.
Steve
I realized recently that I hadn’t ever updated the address on my driver’s license since I moved 18 months ago. This was the first time in 5 years or so that I moved without changing states (in which case you need a whole new driver’s license, obviously) and I simply forgot that you need to change that address when you move. I suspect I’m not the only idiot in the world and that this is a mistake lots of people make innocently.
One of the fallacies you often see in these discussions is the assumption that everyone starts making careful plans to vote 6 months prior to the election and they double-check whether their ID meets the legal requirements for voting and all that. It’s absurd.
Scratch
@ET:
It’s probably not true to say that it will affect Republicans as much as Democrats. The stats that the expert witness brought to court in the lawsuit by the ACLU show that the largest numbers of potential disenfranchised voters will be in Allegheny and Philadelphia counties, the urban and more heavily Democratic areas. The law is burdensome enough that it will mess with Republican voters too, but it will more heavily affect Democrats.
geg6
@ET:
Absolutely not. This was all aimed at blah people. Seems they forgot that their demo group, old white people, have many more problems with this than even those horrible blahs.
Schlemizel
@geg6: Except it will hit POOR older whites, those are much less likely to pull the lever for the party that wants to push them onto the ice flow. The well-to-do GOP seniors have the rules covered
Ash Can
And in other news, I’m thinking Mitt’s campaign caretakers may have finally gotten through to him. It’s already past noon in London, and there’s been no word so far today of him fucking anything up.
PurpleGirl
@Caz: Nope, you do not have to get a new driver’s license right away.
When I moved in 1999, I called NYS Motor Vehicle and they told me I didn’t need to get a card with new address until I renewed it. Since I actually have a Non-driver ID, that was like in 4 years. I mentioned that and the clerk said I could keep using it. Really, I thought. How do I use it if the address doesn’t match a check I want to give to a store. So I insisted on getting a new card.
ETA: You are a troll.
Raven
@Cassidy: ding
geg6
@Schlemizel:
Poor white people in PA do not vote Dem. They tend to be in the rural areas or small coal/steel towns or economically troubled cities like Scranton, all of which are hotbeds of rabid GOPer voters. These people are the very cliche of people voting against their own self interests. I know because I live in one of those counties. Beaver County went for McCain and you can’t get much whiter and economically backward than Beaver County, unless you go to Washington or Greene Counties. They make Beaver County look like a hotbed of radical libs.
NonyNony
@geg6:
This is the thing that I’m slightly surprised that the idjits in PA haven’t thought through. As an Ohio person with some family in PA my understanding is that Philly and Pittsburgh are solid Dem, the rest of the state is solid Republican.
I can only assume that they wrote the rules this way on purpose so that folks in the rural areas get maximum leeway to decide who can vote and that their poll watchers in the cities will push for minimum leeway on who gets to vote.
Because if they really expect everyone to take a maximal stance, they’re cutting off a lot of their own voters.
R-Jud
@geg6:
This. There’s a reason they call it “Pennsyltucky”.
geg6
@NonyNony:
Though there are other Dem strongholds in PA (State College, for one), this is essentially correct. And if they think that the urban dwellers in Pittsburgh and Philly are going to take this lying down, they are crazier than I thought. I can’t speak for Philly, but there have been huge events held by the Urban League, the NAACP, the Dem Party, and many other groups meant to make sure that the people that need ID are going to have them come November.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Caz: Caz,
Please explain to us why gun ownership is so sacred to our republic that we should allow the obviously mentally disturbed own them and yet the right to vote can be denied to a citizen on the most flimsy of technicalities.
Until you can; shut your filth spewing pie hole, you tool.
geg6
@R-Jud:
I have to say, though, I’ve been heartened by some recent trips to our vacation cabin in Titusville over the last couple of years. You would think Titusville would be poor white GOPer heaven, but there were large numbers there who voted for Sestak (his signs were like mushrooms there, popping up all over the place). And the guys at the local watering hole hate Rmoney based on our conversations with them this summer.
Schlemizel
@geg6: Who doesn’t hate Rmoney? 8-{D
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@geg6: It figures, follows with all the rage against “socialism” even though “socialism” is what is stopping those communities from collapsing into an American version Somalia
NonyNony
@geg6:
That’s good to hear. After Kay posted the mess that PA had passed the other day, I wondered what the strategy was. The only thing I could think of is what I said above – that they were going to count on the rural areas to have poll workers who were charitable about reading the rules and make sure that they had challengers in the urban areas to force poll workers to adhere to the strictest reading possible.
Of course there’s also the alternative – that the guys who wrote this up had no grand strategy in mind but were informed mainly by fears from watching Fox News and listening to Rush Limbaugh and wanted to do something to assure their constituents that nobody would be committing vote fraud on their watch. In that case they might have rammed through something sloppy not in some kind of grand scheme to depress the vote, but rather because they’re idiots. (Honestly, given the kind of people who get elected to the Ohio state house, the “idiot” angle might not be as dumb as you might think.)
R-Jud
@geg6:
Yeah, there’s glimmers of hope. All of Mom’s Republican friends and connections at the LWV despise him, and there seemed to be a lot of buyer’s remorse about Corbett when I was chatting with a few of them at my sister’s wedding last month.
Also, we went into a dive diner in Mt. Pocono for breakfast, and while we were there some old-timer started ranting about Barney Frank getting married, throwing around slurs like “f*ggot”. The equally-old-timer behind the counter actually cut him off and told him to leave, “because people got a right to be themselves.”
geg6
@NonyNony:
The Pittsburgh Dems have been on this like white on rice. Rich Fitzgerald (Allegheny County Executive) and Luke Ravenstahl (mayor of Pittsburgh) are pretty worthless assholes most of the time, but they have been stellar on this issue.
I think stupid and evil is the best way to describe the idiots who rammed this through. I mean, if you were really some sort of evil genius, you wouldn’t publicly admit it was a strategy to elect Rmoney like Turzai did or be so clueless about the particulars that you can’t even answer the most basic questions about it like Corbett is. It would be funny if it wasn’t such a fucking outrage.
Quincy
Has anybody discussed this yet? Straight out of the horse’s mouth.
Quincy
Here’s a block quote to expand on my last post:
Mike G
Because obfuscation is the whole point. The object isn’t to enable people to vote, it’s to make sure “those other people” don’t get to vote. Having clear rules on acceptable ID does not serve that purpose.
Kendrah
But that isn’t what you need to know now that Pennsylvania has one of the most restrictive voting laws in the country. You have to go to PennDOT, HERE, and change the address on your driver’s license to match your voter registration address.
1. Please show me where, on the PAVotes website or in any PA state official document, it says that your address on your driver’s license must match your voter registration address.
I am working incredibly hard with progressive organizations to do voter ID education in PA. I have had this as a question and the answer I have gotten from people who are working to interpret the law is that your ID address does not need to match where you are registered to vote.
Your NAME on your ID must closely match the NAME under which you are registered to vote. (This can be particularly disenfranchising to women who have married and changed names, or to immigrants who have unofficially adopted Americanized nicknames.) However, I have never seen anywhere that says your address on your license must match your address where you are registered to vote. I would be most appreciative if you could find for me the language that explicitly states what you have stated in your post about ID address and registration address needing to match.
2. The details of this law are being hammered out in bits and pieces day by day. It is extremely confusing and I fear that posts such as yours will only add to confusion. In our effort to advocate for voting rights, let’s talk about the injustice of it all without adding a part that “isn’t what you need to know”.
Regardless of the outcome of the current hearings in Harrisburg, the Republicans are still winning the voter ID battle simply by the storm of confusion and misinformation progressives are putting out in a goodhearted effort to try to make sense of it all.
Schlemizel
@Quincy: Mouth? looks more like a horses ass.
How long will our dear friends in the librule media be able to ignore 2000 lb gorilla on this issue? Will anyone have the courage to call this what it is?
danimal
…and the pundits keep asking if minority enthusiasm for voting will be down this year. Hint: actively attempting to take your vote away is actually quite a motivator.
rikyrah
thank you for keeping us aware, kay. have seen several pieces lately on this travesty piece of voter suppression legislation.
slag
So now we know who’s really creating all those onerous regulations trying to solve problems that don’t exist.
The GOP and the DMV sitting in a tree K.I.S.S.I.N.G.
slag
@Quincy: That whole minority voter suppression thing just demonstrates the Republicans’ “political acumen”. Why do you hate good politics? Commi!
smintheus
Some good news for once from PA today. A court (narrowly) overturned some of the worst provisions in Corbett’s obnoxious gift to his oil-industry backers, a new law that opens up the whole state to drilling. Among other things, the law would have prevented land owners and local zoning ordinances from keeping nuisances like wells and open pits away from residences and even schools; basically it nullified local control and made every square inch of the state potentially an open sludge pit.
Here’s hoping the court will also overturn the power grab that is the voter ID law.
catpal
@smintheus: and that latest Unconstitutional Repub law in PA has led to the I wish this could really happen in PA
The impeachment of Pa. Constitution-shredding Tom Corbett
Snarki, child of Loki
I look forward to using my US Passport for voting purposes.
Where I have to write in my address myself, and the US State Dept. strongly suggests “write it in PENCIL”.
Caz
@JPL: A 4-6 hour wait? That sounds like an issue with the DMV or other govt office, not an issue with the law. But then again, govt is notoriously inefficient, incompetent, and slow when it comes to waiting in line to get an ID.
If you had to wait that long at a private business, you might never go back and they’d go out of business cuz no one would patronize their biz. But govt has no profit motive. They can suck ass, and for one thing, there is not alternative competitor to take your ID biz to. Additionally, if govt loses money from its inefficient, incompetent operations, they can just raise taxes. They receive the same amount of money whether they do a good job or a piss poor one.
The problem here is the intrinsic inefficiency of govt, not this particular law requiring an ID.
Besides, there is plenty of voter fraud around the country. Just Google “voter fraud” and see how many instances pop up on your screen. Requiring a photo ID would unquestionably curb voter fraud. Will it totally eliminate it? No; nothing will. But it will cut down on it just as requiring photo ID’s for liquor purchases, cigarette purchases, and a litany of other stuff cuts down on fraud in those cases.
This issue isn’t about burdens on voters; it’s about politics. The Obama administration knows that most of the people who might be affected by this vote democrat, so they want to ensure there aren’t any requirements at all that might cause them to lose a vote. They don’t care about voter fraud or burdens on voters; they just care about maximizing their votes from minorities, the poor, single parents, etc. Because these are the people the govt makes sure to give plenty of handouts to so that they will keep voting for them. People who get handouts love them and want to keep the handout party in office.
Robbing Peter to pay Paul only works until there are more Pauls than Peters, at which point there isn’t enough money from the Peters to support all the Pauls, and then all hell breaks loose. See Greece. We aren’t that far behind Greece, but you people still think it can’t happen here. 4 more years of your socialist, nanny-state, big brother hero and we just might be well down the Greece path.
Kendrah
@slag: I think the DMV (here we call it PennDOT) is none too happy to be dragged into this mess. They are short staffed as it is and their workers are being asked to help enact an extremely complicated law about which the details are constantly changing. It is hard enough for them to get done what they need to get done without this headache, and on a constantly slashed budget.
I recently moved to PA and had to go to PennDOT three times to try to get my new in state license. It took forever and while I wanted to get pissed off at the workers and call them incompetent, it really is just a matter of not having enough of them to serve the amount of customers they have. When our taxes go to foot the military’s bills and bail out banks, there doesn’t seem to be enough to go around to continue to hire public workers to do the important job of serving citizens. I don’t think the government in incompetent, it is just not properly funded. I would be happy to pay more taxes if a larger percentage of it went to services that mattered.
But back to the issue at hand. The Republicans know that PennDOT is massively understaffed, has limited hours, and there are not very many of them. They are hard to get to and you have to often miss work and miss out on pay to go there and get through the system. A great way to make sure that poor people do not vote.