• Home
  • Opinion
  • Quizzes
  • Redistricting
  • Sections
  • About Us
  • Voting
  • Events
  • Civic Ed
  • Campaign Finance
  • Directory
  • Election Dissection
  • Fact Check
  • Glossary
  • Independent Voter News
  • News
  • Analysis
  • Subscriptions
  • Log in
Leveraging Our Differences
  • news & opinion
    • Big Picture
      • Civic Ed
      • Ethics
      • Leadership
      • Leveraging big ideas
      • Media
    • Business & Democracy
      • Corporate Responsibility
      • Impact Investment
      • Innovation & Incubation
      • Small Businesses
      • Stakeholder Capitalism
    • Elections
      • Campaign Finance
      • Independent Voter News
      • Redistricting
      • Voting
    • Government
      • Balance of Power
      • Budgeting
      • Congress
      • Judicial
      • Local
      • State
      • White House
    • Justice
      • Accountability
      • Anti-corruption
      • Budget equity
    • Columns
      • Beyond Right and Left
      • Civic Soul
      • Congress at a Crossroads
      • Cross-Partisan Visions
      • Democracy Pie
      • Our Freedom
  • Pop Culture
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
  • events
  • About
      • Mission
      • Advisory Board
      • Staff
      • Contact Us
Sign Up
  1. Home>
  2. Voting>
  3. absentee voting>

Suit filed against Va. witness requirements for absentee voters

David Hawkings
April 20, 2020
United States and Virginia flags
Oleksii Liskonih/Getty Images

It ended up as a second-tier dispute in the legal battle over Wisconsin's election, but now it's been revived with potentially more prominence. The question: Is it fair, or even constitutional, to require voters during the pandemic to get close to someone who can countersign their mail-in ballots?

A federal appeals court this month refused to suspend Wisconsin's witness rule, saying the potential for fraud outweighed the risks of spreading Covid-19 during close contact over absentee ballots.

The same argument will now be revisited in Virginia. The American Civil Liberties Union asked a federal judge Friday to block a similar law in Virginia, one requiring voters to find someone to witness them completing their absentee ballots.


The lawsuit, filed on behalf of three voters and the League of Women Voters, argues the law will otherwise force people who live alone or can't get to a polling place to choose between skipping the presidential election and risking their health. And the result, the claim says, could be "massive disenfranchisement" in both the June 23 congressional primaries and in November — especially of the almost one-third of Virginians older than 65 who live alone, and are in the age group most vulnerable to the novel coronavirus.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

State officials signaled a response to the ACLU's filing was possible.

"Free and fair elections are at the core of our democracy and no Virginian should have to choose between their health and exercising their right to vote," said Charlotte Gomer, a spokeswoman for Democratic Attorney General Mark Herring.

Ten other states have such witness requirements. Virginia, Wisconsin and North Carolina are the only purplish 2020 battlegrounds. Rhode Island is the only blue state on the roster, which otherwise includes reliably red Alabama, Alaska, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma and South Carolina.

Virginia's law is one of the most explicit. It says a voter who submits an absentee ballot by mail must open the envelope containing the ballot in front of another person, fill out the paper and then ask the witness to sign the outside of the envelope before it is mailed.

The state permits people to get such a ballot without having an excuse, and about 10 percent of its votes have been cast absentee in most recent elections.

The lawsuit is part of a broader campaign in courthouses across the country, by Democrats and their allies in the civil rights and voting rights communities, to use the public health crisis as a lever to ease restrictions on voting this year.

Although some Republican governors have decided to ease the rules in their states, many GOP elected officials are following President Trump's lead and opposing any loosening of restrictions on the grounds that would spur election fraud. But there is minimal evidence, at best, of such crimes.

"It's just another attempt by the Democrats to make voter fraud easier," said John March, a spokesman for the Virginia GOP.

From Your Site Articles
  • A model in Virginia, where political reform and pragmatism won this ... ›
  • Virginia subs Election Day holiday for Confederate heroes - The ... ›
  • Virginia passes voting reforms, punts on popular vote compact - The ... ›
  • New York delays primary; Virginia eases ballot access - The Fulcrum ›
  • Voting rights advocates hail victories in Virginia, Nevada - The Fulcrum ›
  • Lawsuit fights Virginia's liberalized absentee ballot rules - The Fulcrum ›
Related Articles Around the Web
  • Virginia Absentee Ballots - Vote.org ›
  • Virginia House approves significant absentee voting expansion ... ›
  • Va. lawmakers pass bill to allow no-excuse absentee voting ›
  • Absentee Voting - Virginia Department of Elections ›
absentee voting

Want to write
for The Fulcrum?

If you have something to say about ways to protect or repair our American democracy, we want to hear from you.

Submit
Get some Leverage Sign up for The Fulcrum Newsletter
Follow
Contributors

Reform in 2023: Leadership worth celebrating

Layla Zaidane

Two technology balancing acts

Dave Anderson

Reform in 2023: It’s time for the civil rights community to embrace independent voters

Jeremy Gruber

Congress’ fix to presidential votes lights the way for broader election reform

Kevin Johnson

Democrats and Republicans want the status quo, but we need to move Forward

Christine Todd Whitman

Reform in 2023: Building a beacon of hope in Boston

Henry Santana
Jerren Chang
latest News

Ron DeSantis and the rise of political racism

Lawrence Goldstone
3h

Curriculum regulations and book bans: Modern day anti-literacy laws?

Katherine Kapustka
3h

Podcast: 2024 Senate: Democrats have a lot of defending to do

Our Staff
3h

Podcast: Collage: The promise of Black History Month

Our Staff
22h

Steward leadership

David L. Nevins
01 February

Sharing a common fate

Kevin Frazier
01 February
Videos

Video: The Supreme Court and originalism

Our Staff

Video: How the baby boom changed American politics

Our Staff

Video: What the speakership election tells us about the 118th Congress webinar

Our Staff

Video: We need more bipartisan commitment to democracy: Pennsylvania governor

Our Staff

Video: Meet the citizen activists championing primary reform

Our Staff

Video: Veterans for Political Innovation - Who we are

Our Staff
Podcasts

Podcast: 2024 Senate: Democrats have a lot of defending to do

Our Staff
3h

Podcast: Collage: The promise of Black History Month

Our Staff
22h

Podcast: Separating news from noise

Our Staff
30 January

Podcast: Deepening democracy in the states

Our Staff
27 January
Recommended
Ron DeSantis and the rise of political racism

Ron DeSantis and the rise of political racism

Big Picture
Curriculum regulations and book bans: Modern day anti-literacy laws?

Curriculum regulations and book bans: Modern day anti-literacy laws?

Big Picture
Podcast: 2024 Senate: Democrats have a lot of defending to do

Podcast: 2024 Senate: Democrats have a lot of defending to do

Podcasts
Video: The Supreme Court and originalism

Video: The Supreme Court and originalism

Justice
Podcast: Collage: The promise of Black History Month

Podcast: Collage: The promise of Black History Month

Podcasts
Steward leadership

Steward leadership

Big Picture