The BDN Editorial Board operates independently from the newsroom, and does not set policies or contribute to reporting or editing articles elsewhere in the newspaper or on bangordailynews.com.
Mainers, who generally turn out in high numbers to vote, have been supportive of numerous measures to make it easier to cast a ballot in Maine. For example, a 2011 law that ended same-day voter registration was quickly overturned by voters in a people’s veto.
Polling shows that Mainers are also generally supportive of the idea of requiring identification to vote, a longtime Republican proposal.
This fall, Pine Tree State voters will likely get a chance to weigh in on a proposed voter ID law. Backers of a citizen initiative to require voters to present a valid ID to cast a ballot last week turned in signatures to place the question on the November ballot.
But, as Mainers are learning, this ballot question is about much more than voter ID. It contains several measures that will make it harder to vote, especially for those who want to cast an absentee ballot.
Beyond likely being unpopular, these elements of the proposed referendum are concerning because, if enacted, they are likely to make it harder for some Mainers to cast a ballot, which could depress voter participation.
It would restrict the availability and drop off of absentee ballots. It would end the current practice of allowing voters to request to have absentee ballots sent to them for every election, instead requiring that an absentee ballot be requested prior to each election. Such requests could no longer be made over the phone. The initiative would also prevent an authorized third party from delivering an absentee ballot, a service on which many elderly and disabled Mainers rely.
As Bangor Daily News politics reporter Billy Kobin wrote last week, the initiative would bar municipalities from having more than one absentee ballot drop box. This provision would only affect Portland and Orono, the home of the University of Maine. Both are considered liberal in terms of voting patterns.
The initiative would require a “bipartisan team of election officials” — rather than the local clerk or their designees — to retrieve ballots from the boxes. This provision could increase costs and work for smaller towns that may have a hard time recruiting such a team to retrieve ballots, Secretary of State Shenna Bellows told the BDN. She called the absentee-related provisions of the initiative “hugely problematic.”
In a column published last week by the BDN, Anna Kellar of the League of Women Voters warned that the provisions in the ballot question would suppress voter participation, especially among rural and senior populations.
“This campaign is a broad attack on voting rights that, if implemented, would disenfranchise many Maine people,” Kellar wrote in the column.
“These restrictions can and will harm every type of voter, with senior and rural voters experiencing the worst of the disenfranchisement. It will be costly, too. Taxpayers will be on the hook to pay for a new system that is unnecessary, expensive, and harmful to Maine voters,” she added.
Given that voter fraud is vanishingly rare in Maine, this referendum is an extreme solution to a nearly nonexistent problem. Rather than making it harder for people to vote, this editorial board has long supported efforts to increase voter participation.
