Skip to content
Project 2025
Search

Latest Stories

Follow Us:
Top Stories
Prediction Markets Are Gambling, Despite What They Tell The Government

Prediction Markets Are Gambling, Despite What They Tell The Government

Rolling Back Health Equity Training Requirements in Medical Schools Harms Us All

Rolling Back Health Equity Training Requirements in Medical Schools Harms Us All

Medicare Health Insurance Card. Social Security Card with Stethoscope and pen

Saving Medicare Republicans Are Privatizing Medicare

MAGA is starting to question Trump

MAGA is starting to question Trump

Just the Facts: What the Iran Nuclear Deal Was and Why It Matters

Just the Facts: What the Iran Nuclear Deal Was and Why It Matters

Governor gets bill dropping in-state driver's license rule for New Hampshire college voters

Governor gets bill dropping in-state driver's license rule for New Hampshire college voters

New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu

U.S. Department of Agriculture
The Fulcrum
By The FulcrumJun 10, 2019
The Fulcrum
The Fulcrum staff.
See More Writings by author

It's now up to New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu to decide whether to do away with some registration requirements that students say amount to a poll tax.

The state Senate last week joined the state House – both controlled by Democrats – in voting to drop a requirement that collegiate voters have in-state driver's licenses and car registrations. Sununu is a Republican.

Opponents of those requirements, instituted last year when Republicans ran the state legislature, said they amount to a poll tax that discriminates against the state's students.

The rollback legislation has generated intense interest on the state's college campuses, where turnout could prove decisive in the nation's first Democratic presidential primary. Fresh off the Iowa caucuses the week before, a field that for now stands at two-dozen candidates is sure to shrink significantly after New Hampshire votes Feb. 11, and the turnout among collegiate voters could make the difference for some White House aspirants on the cusp of political survival.

College students, who are mostly from out of state, account for roughly 90,000 of the state's 1.2 million residents. (Even at the University of New Hampshire only half the students come from the Granite State.)

A sit-in protest by students at the Capitol last month resulted in 10 arrests.

State Sen. Tom Sherman, a Democrat who favors the rollback bill, told the New Hampshire Union Leader that registering a car and obtaining a driver's license can be expensive for a student. "That will turn some away from the polls," he said. "New Hampshire needs to encourage its students in civic participation and make them feel welcome."

But Republican state Sen. Regina Birdsell said repealing the requirement would actually create a two-tier system in which the laws would be applied differently to those who live in the state permanently and those there to attend college.

Sununu initially was concerned about last year's law, but he signed it after receiving an advisory opinion from the state Supreme Court saying it is constitutional.


Latest news

A close up of a person reading a book in a bookstore.
Education

Promoting Civic Literacy for America’s 250th

Bar graph of shopping carts
Economy

Inflation Has Changed—And So Has Who Pays for It

A Ballroom Won’t Save Our Children
Governance & Legislation

A Ballroom Won’t Save Our Children

Death with Dignity: A Person's Right to Choose Life or Death
Health

Death with Dignity: A Person's Right to Choose Life or Death

Read More

Official ballots with a chain and lock over them, and the USA flag behind them.

The impact of election fraud claims and voting laws on democracy in the United States. Daniel O. Jamison examines voter suppression concerns, mail-in ballot policies, and the broader political struggle over election integrity.

Getty Images, JJ Gouin

If It Ain’t Broke, Don’t Fix It

For nearly ten years, claims that our elections are riddled with fraud have threatened the foundation of our democratic republic.

It is alleged that Democrats have flooded the country with illegal immigrants who then illegally vote for Democrats. Purportedly to protect the country from this, Republicans seek legislation that would, among other provisions, restrict vote-by-mail, require potentially expensive and onerous proof of citizenship to register to vote, and require potentially expensive photo identification to vote.

Keep ReadingShow less
The Fahey Q&A with Elizabeth Rasmussen

An in-depth interview with Elizabeth Rasmussen of Better Boundaries on Utah’s redistricting battle, Proposition 4, and the fight to protect ballot initiatives, fair maps, and democratic accountability.

The Fahey Q&A with Elizabeth Rasmussen

Since organizing the Voters Not Politicians 2018 ballot initiative that put citizens in charge of drawing Michigan's legislative maps, Fahey has been the founding executive director of The People, which is forming statewide networks to promote government accountability. She regularly interviews colleagues in the world of democracy reform for The Fulcrum.

Elizabeth Rasmussen is the Executive Director for Better Boundaries, a Utah-based organization fighting for fair maps, defending the citizen initiative process, preserving checks and balances, and building a better future. Currently making headlines in the state, Better Boundaries is working to protect Proposition 4, and with it, the rights of Utah voters.

Keep ReadingShow less
A sign that reads, "Voter Registration," hanging from the cieling, pointing to an office with the words, "Voter registration," above its doorway.

The voter registration office at the Nueces County Courthouse in Corpus Christi, Texas on Sept. 11, 2024. Voting rights groups are challenging the state's use of a federal database to check the citizenship status of people on the state's voter roll.

Gabriel Cárdenas for Votebeat

Voting Rights Groups Challenge Texas’ Removal of Potential Noncitizens From the Voter Roll

What happened?

Voting rights groups are suing the Texas Secretary of State’s Office and some county election officials to prevent the removal of voters from the state’s voter roll based on use of a federal database to verify citizenship. They also claim the state failed to crosscheck its own records for proof of citizenship it already possessed before seeking to remove voters.

Keep ReadingShow less
People at voting booths, casing their votes in front of a mural depicting the American flag, a bald eagle flying, and children holding hands in the foreground.

Virginia voters cast their ballots at Robius Elementary School November 4, 2025 in Midlothian, Virginia.

Getty Images, Win McNamee

Fixing Broken Systems: America’s Path Beyond Polarization

"A bad system will beat a good person every time" is a famous quote by Dr. W. Edwards Deming, the American statistician most often credited with the Japanese economic miracle after WWII. Even talented, hardworking people cannot overcome a flawed, dysfunctional, or unfair system, making system improvement more crucial than solely blaming individuals for failures.

Fixing “bad systems” is viewed by political scientists and reform organizations as the primary path to reducing America’s political dysfunction. Current systemic structures often create "misaligned incentives" that reward extreme partisanship and obstruction rather than governance. The most prominent electoral system reforms proposed by experts include:

Keep ReadingShow less
© Copyright 2026