![]() ![]() However, most agencies have either made minimal progress on their initial strong commitments to expand voter access or have left important opportunities on the table. And by incorporating voter registration into the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program, the Treasury Department is helping to address persistent income-based gaps in voter registration by improving access to voter registration among people with low incomes. The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has also begun working with state election officials to secure NVRA designations. For example, by accepting National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) designations for the tribal institutions it operates, the Department of the Interior has moved to ensure that eligible students who attend these institutions have regular access to high-quality voter registration. That’s why the ACLU, alongside a coalition of civil rights organizations, issued the report “ Strengthening Democracy: A Progress Report on Federal Agency Action to Promote Access to Voting,” to highlight, at the agency level, what has been done and what is still needed to help ensure every eligible voter has robust, easy, and equal access to the ballot box.Ī few agencies have made noteworthy headway. Building on its promising start, it’s time for the Biden administration and agencies to finish the job and fulfill the promise of the voting access executive order. On the anniversary of Bloody Sunday and the two-year anniversary of this executive order, we acknowledge both that the administration and agencies have made progress, and that significant work remains. The voting access executive order is an important step toward achieving this goal because it gets the federal government involved in aiding with voter registration, just as state governments already do. In a democracy, governments at all levels should be doing everything they can to help eligible people register to vote. In the order, President Biden directed federal agencies to “consider ways to expand citizens’ opportunities to register to vote and to obtain information about, and participate in, the electoral process.” ![]() ![]() On MaPresident Biden issued Executive Order 14019 Promoting Access to Voting, a visionary executive order that has the potential to make registration and voting more accessible for millions of Americans, including communities historically excluded from the political process. This march led to the signing and passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 by Congress and President Lyndon B. The brutal, unprovoked attack sparked national outrage, became known as “Bloody Sunday,” and was a catalyst of the voting rights movement. The marchers were protesting the murder of a young, unarmed Black man and the continued disenfranchisement of Black people in the South. Fifty-eight years ago on March 7, television viewers saw 500 peaceful demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, teargassed and beaten by police. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |