Publications & Talks

Originally published on July 17, 2012

Ten states now have unprecedented restrictive voter ID laws. Alabama, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Mississippi, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Wisconsin all require citizens to produce specific types of government-issued photo identification before they can cast a vote that will count. Legal precedent requires these states to provide free photo ID to eligible voters who do not have one. Unfortunately, these free IDs are not equally accessible to all voters. This report is the first comprehensive assessment of the difficulties that eligible voters face in obtaining free photo ID.

View the PDF version here.

This report reviews how prepared each state is to ensure that every eligible voter can vote, and that every
vote is counted as cast. Because we cannot predict where machines will fail during the upcoming national
election, every state should be as prepared as possible for system failures.

The Verified Voting Foundation, the Rutgers Law School Newark Constitutional Litigation Clinic and
Common Cause surveyed states’ voting equipment and ranked the states according to their preparedness.
The rankings are based on how states laws and practices compare to a set of best practices already being
used in some places.

Document: 

ExecutiveSummaryAugust2012.pdf

Originally published August 28, 2006

On August 28, 2006, the Brennan Center released a report and policy proposals regarding the performance of various voting systems and their ability to allow voters to cast valid ballots that reflect their intended choices without undue delay or burdens. This system quality is known as usability. Following several high-profile controversies in the last few elections including most notoriously, the 2000 controversy over the butterfly ballot in Palm Beach voting system usability is a subject of utmost concern to voters and election officials.

Document: 

The Machine of Democracy.pdf

At a time when political operatives are trying to make it harder for some Americans to participate in the democratic process, community voter registration drives continue to increase the numbers of eligible Americans registered to vote. But, in recent years, state legislatures have attempted to make it harder for voter registration drives to operate. More than half of the states have some laws governing community-based voter registration drives. State Restrictions on Voter Registration Drives is the first comprehensive review of those laws.

Document: 

State Restrictions on Voter Registration Drives.pdf

The Recall Election is Tuesday, June 5, 2012.  Polls are open from 7am-8pm CST.

The conventional criticism of the Occupy Wall Street movement – that it is long on complaints about income inequality, but short on proposed remedies – may need revision.

A number of “occupations,” including ones in Minnesota, have latched onto a constitutional amendment proposal that would deny corporations legal status as persons with full First Amendment rights.

Thank you Mitt Romney! Thank you for standing tall, speaking so forthrightly, and rallying so many democracy-loving Americans to join together in THE political fight of our time.

A year ago, New Yorkers watched in horror as voters in the progressive heartland of Wisconsin replaced progressive standard-bearer Russ Feingold with a Tea Party mega-millionaire, and the state’s capitol came under the control of self-described Tea Party Republicans. Months later, the impact of that electoral change became clear. Governor Scott Walker unleashed attacks on the right to organize, to engage in collective bargaining, to access health care, food, shelter, a quality education and even on the right to vote.

The Wall Street protests represent the most potentially transforming political movement in generations: finally a revolt against the root problem that corrupts and paralyzes U.S. government. And the nascent movement might actually succeed if we stop turning ordinary Americans against each other along the tired and destructive battle lines of left vs. right.

For the past forty years, the expansion of unchecked corporate power has taken over Washington and state capitals. Armies of industry funded lobbyists, PR firms, think tanks, fake "Astroturf" groups and billions in campaign contributions have quietly corrupted a vulnerable system of government and seized control.

In the 2010 US Supreme Court case, Citizens United v. Federal ElectionCommission, the judges of the highest court in the land narrowly ruled that corporations were "people" with First Amendment free speech rights. The corollary of this judgment is that corporations, as "persons," have the right to contribute unlimited funds to political campaigns as an exercise of their free speech.

If businesses are people, as Mitt Romney says, perhaps we should rewrite our Constitution to reflect that

Finally, Mitt Romney admitted publicly what too many Republican politicians — and plenty of Democrats, too — really think about we, the people. "Corporations are people," the former Massachusetts governor pronounced.

Large multinational corporations today wield enormous power. They determine whether our oceans are filled with oil, whether we get more floods, droughts, hurricanes, tornadoes and other signs of an accelerating climate crisis, whether Americans have jobs or our jobs are outsourced to low-wage countries, whether our military budget keeps expanding, and whether our economy implodes, to name a few of the thousands of ways that mega corporations impact us on a daily basis.

The fundamental question here is, who is in charge of our country -- the big corporations or the people and their elected officials? Who should make the decisions about our well being, our future, our environment and our jobs?