Punitive registration drive reform bill is voter suppression | Opinion

Charlane Oliver
Guest columnist

The Equity Alliance, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization, has spent the past three years mobilizing in communities of color to educate and empower people to engage in the political process.

Last fall, we were one of 20 organizations that participated in the Tennessee Black Voter Project as part of a collective effort to register approximately 86,000 black voters. Led by our co-founder Tequila Johnson, it was the first-ever statewide effort in Tennessee’s modern history dedicated solely to registering African Americans to vote.

Charlane Oliver

Secretary of State Tre Hargett recently announced he is proposing legislation that would assess the country’s most aggressive civil and criminal penalties — up to a $10,000 fine and class A misdemeanor — on third-party organizations who submit deficient forms while conducting large-scale voter registration drives of 100 or more people. This kind of law will have a chilling effect on any group trying to conduct voter registration drives and should alarm any church, nonprofit, civic group or business that registers voters in Tennessee.

In the Volunteer State, it is especially wrong to penalize volunteers for helping to promote civic engagement.

Large scale voter registration efforts would be less urgent if the Secretary of State were doing its job to ensure free, fair and safe elections for all eligible Tennesseans. During Hargett’s tenure, Tennessee has consistently ranked in the bottom 5% of all states for voter participation. In 2014, our state ranked 50th in voter turnout and 40th in voter registration. From 1998-2008, voter registrations were steadily on the rise but plateaued at 3.9 million after Hargett took office in 2009.

His opinion column published in March in The Tennessean repeatedly referenced the work of the Tennessee Black Voter Project but referred to the coalition as a “voter activist group,” making it clear that his motivation for passing HB1079 is driven partly, and maybe subconsciously, by race. This type of coded language--to imply that we’re an angry mob of black people with a hidden agenda “to collect precious voter data”--only perpetuates a partisan cloak of fear that dog whistles to a certain base of voters.

Civic groups have been conducting voter registration drives for decades in Tennessee, and no one seemed to have a problem with the integrity of this well-intentioned activity. Yet, three months after black-led groups mobilized to register thousands of black voters, Hargett has conjured up legislation to carve out people that he does not want to vote.

Our state should be making it easier, not harder, for people to vote, especially in communities that have historically faced barriers to civic participation and continue to confront institutional roadblocks to voting. The bill is in retaliation to the work done through Tennessee Black Voter Project. This is voter suppression.

► Opinion:I wanted to vote for my first time in 2018, but Tennessee failed me

If Hargett wants to effectively reform voter registration laws, he should start by fixing the registration form itself. The paper form is prone to errors and confusion, and people are reluctant to provide their nine-digit social security number to protect the privacy of their personal data. No person or organization is trying to turn in bad voter applications. But the fact remains that people make mistakes. Whether it's an applicant’s error or a mistake by the organizer, it should never result in a financial penalty.

Tennessee Secretary of state Tre Hargett.

Since online voter registration was implemented in 2017, Hargett would lead you to believe that voting in Tennessee is a smooth and seamless process, but problems encountered during the 2018 midterm election are indicative of larger systemic issues. Strict voter ID laws, voter purging, complicated absentee voting rules, a 30-day registration cutoff, modern-day poll taxes, and outdated, glitchy voter machines all play a role in tarnishing the integrity of our state’s elections.

To preserve the integrity of the election process, our states should enact election policies that are proven in other states to promote greater participation in our democracy, such as same-day registration, automatic voter registration and vote-by-mail.

To be clear, we strongly opposed HB1079 but want to work collaboratively with the Secretary of State’s office to fix inefficiencies in the voter registration process. Elected officials, election administrators, and community groups should be working together, not against each other, to make democracy work for all Tennessee residents.

Charlane Oliver is the co-founder and board president of The Equity Alliance.