Voter ID bill moves to NC Senate

A controversial proposal that would require voters to show a photo ID at the polls made its first step toward becoming law Wednesday, passing the N.C. House and moving to the N.C. Senate.

Known as the Voter Information Verification Act, House Bill 589 would require residents to have a photo ID to vote in the 2016 election, reviving an effort that failed when Gov. Bev Perdue vetoed a similar bill in 2011.

Gov. Pat McCrory pledged to pass a voter ID law in his campaign last year, as well as many Republicans who now lead both chambers of the N.C. General Assembly.

Rep. Ruth Samuelson, R-Mecklenburg, a primary sponsor of the bill, said there needs to be electoral reform.

“This legislation serves a very real purpose in protecting the integrity of every single vote,” she said in an email.

But the policy has been criticized by left-leaning groups such as the NAACP and Democracy N.C., who say it would disenfranchise voters.

Rep. Henry Michaux, D-Durham, said during debate on the House floor that the bill was unconstitutional and would unfairly target minorities.

“This will cause people not to vote, not to exercise that constitutional right,” he said.

Rep. Paul Luebke, D-Durham, said the bill would also deter college students from voting.

The bill allows students to use IDs from UNC-system schools, but not IDs from private universities.

“If you look at an ID from NCCU and an ID from Duke University, they really seem of similar quality,” he said. “It seems to me the intent is to make it more difficult for students to vote.”

But Samuelson said private schools are not run by the government, and the IDs should not be considered state-issued.

Issuing free identification cards to voters who do not have other forms of photo IDs would cost less than $1 million in the next year, according to a fiscal analysis by the legislature.

Some conservatives have also criticized the bill for not being strict enough.

Jay Delancy, executive director of the pro-voter ID Voter Integrity Project of N.C., said the problem is not that the bill disenfranchises, but that it will not curb voter fraud.

He said the allowance of student IDs is one of the bill’s many compromises on altering the voting process.

“Finally we have leadership who ran on a platform of reforming election laws, and now they are watering them down,” he said. “In many ways this law puts us worse off than before — at least people were suspicious of the fraud.”

Luebke said the bill is likely to pass the N.C. Senate, where it will be debated next, and be signed into law by McCrory.

Contact the desk editor at state@dailytarheel.com.