alt Hacker NewsThe issue with voter ID laws isn't with the concept of having to identify yourself at the ballot box, it is with the way it is implemented.
For example, in my EU country I can vote with my passport, my drivers license, or my ID card, and they accept documents which are expired for up to 5 years. For context: this is less restrictive than the documents anyone is technically required to carry every time they leave their home! The number of people who can't meet this requirement is basically zero, and a decent bunch of municipalities offer them for free to poor people.
Meanwhile US has no universal ID system, which allows the pro voter ID groups to carve out a list of "acceptable" IDs which just so happens to be popular with the people that are going to vote for one side of the political spectrum, while excluding the forms of ID which are popular with the other side. And of course it's not just about identification, as they also add a bunch of irrelevant details to the requirements like the information having to exactly match your birth certificate.
Combine that with the failed two-party system where even a handful of votes often completely swings the political landscape and it is pretty obvious what is going on.
State ID (usually a driver’s license) is the defacto universal ID system.
It’s not hard to get, and you need it to do everything from filling a scheduled prescription, buying alcohol, entering a bar, flying on a plane, or purchasing cold medicine. You literally cannot function as an independent adult without one.
You also need to show it — along with a second form of ID — to be hired at a job.
Anyone claiming a state ID requirement meaningfully prevents anyone from voting is being deeply unserious.
If they actually believed what they claim, they’d be campaigning to remove the ID requirements that are already pervasive in our daily lives. They are not.
I’ll also note that buying a gun requires not just multiple forms of ID, but also an entire background check. If we can do that for one constitutionally enumerated right, we can damn well require a photo ID to cast a ballot.