Organizers of a ballot campaign seeking to require Maine voters to present a photo ID before voting submitted their signature petitions Monday to get their proposal on the November ballot. Supporters argue that it's a way to ensure election integrity, but opponents warn that the measure is unnecessary and contains changes that go far beyond requiring a photo ID.
Flanked in the state house Hall of Flags by dozens of volunteers and armed with what they say are more than 170,000 voter signatures, supporters repeatedly described the voter ID ballot initiative as the will of the people long blocked by Democratic state lawmakers in Augusta.
Republican Rep. Laurel Libby, of Auburn, pointed to signatures collected from nearly 300 municipalities as evidence that support is widespread.
"That is a thunderous roar from every corner of our state," she said.
Libby is one of the leaders of Voter ID for ME, a campaign connected to a pair of political action committees that have raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to support conservative candidates and causes. The ballot campaign's lead funder is the PAC For Our Future, and so far, that group's lead donor is an organization long associated with Leonard Leo, a conservative activist credited with remaking the U.S. Supreme Court.
The voter ID campaign's connection to Leo may ensure that it has more than enough money to convince Mainers that the proposal is the right one for a state where voter fraud is exceedingly rare.
But for now, Libby's pitch centers on the popularity of the concept of showing a photo ID before filling out an election ballot.
"Thirty-six other states have recognized the importance of strengthening our elections, of protecting the democratic process. And yet, Maine, lags behind," Libby said.
According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 36 other states do require voters to present some form of identification before voting, but only nine of those states have strict photo ID requirements. Maine would become the tenth if this proposal is backed by voters.
And if national polling is accurate, there's a good chance that they will. A Gallup poll from October found that 84%of respondents favor photo ID for voting.
The campaign has frequently highlighted that number, but opponents of the measure are hoping that it's less-discussed provisions will give voters pause if it qualifies for the November ballot.
"The citizens initiative presented to us today has so much more that is really problematic. It is a wolf in sheep's clothing," said Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat elected by the Legislature.
Democratic Secretary of State Shenna Bellows has long opposed requiring voters to present a photo ID. In her previous role as the director of the ACLU of Maine, she argued that photo ID and other voting restrictions disenfranchise eligible voters and suppress turnout.
She said that voter fraud prevention happens at registration — when Mainers have to show proof of identity — and through checks performed by local clerks.
And she said this proposal would create a host of new restrictions that go beyond the debate over photo ID; it limits each municipality to a single drop box and replaces election clerks and town officials with collecting those ballots with partisans from the Democratic and Republican party; it ends a program that allows senior citizens to sign up to receive an absentee ballot automatically before each election; it eliminates student IDs as a valid form of photo identification; and it rolls back the time allowed to request an absentee ballot.
Bellows is encouraging voters to take a hard look at those provisions, as well as another that flips the burden of Maine's ballot challenge process from partisan poll watchers to the voter whose eligibility is in question.
"Reasonable people may have differing views of a voter ID being shown on Election Day," she said. "That is an element of this bill, but there are a lot of other provisions in this legislation that may actually undermine election security and voter participation in our state."
The proposal is also drawing opposition from the Maine League of Women Voters, a voting rights organization that has historically opposed photo ID at the polls. Spokesperson Jen Lancaster said the measure purports to fight voter fraud, but reverses efforts to expand voting access.
"It would be one of the most restrictive bills across the nation and it's here in Maine. And they're asking the Maine people to vote on it while misleading and leaving out all these other things that it's going to do, which is rollback absentee voting, things that are very popular with the Maine people," Lancaster said.
But supporters counter that photo ID is a commonsense reform to the voting process embraced by Mainers and an overwhelming majority of Americans.
They're hoping that sentiment will prevail in November, but first, state election officials will have to validate the campaign's signatures and decide whether it has more than 67,000 to qualify for the fall ballot.
They have 30 days to complete that task.
