Yesterday, state House and Senate Republicans held a press conference to highlight a horrific bill, H.B.14-1164, going through the legislature. The bill portends to correct some issues with last year’s voter fraud modernization act that Democrats shoved through the state legislature, to the dismay of even The Denver Post when it was under Hick staff leadership. (Curtis, we’re talking about you.)
So, a bill amending that bill should be a good thing right? WRONG. H.B 1164 exacerbates the issue. Here are 10 problems with the bill:
10) The bill gets rid of residency time requirements. Want to run for office? Just intend to move, you don’t actually have to. (see Amy Speers) Want to vote, but you’re only 16? Just intend to be 18, it’s ok, you’re within the law. Intend to be alive for the election? It’s ok to die – you can still vote. We’re kidding with the last one. We think.
9) The bill codifies an unenforceable election code. Despite its claims, there is no local government election code in the bill and it allows the district election officer to pick and choose which rules to follow.
8) It removes all Secretary of State oversight for special districts and assigns no other authority to oversee elections. Because, as we’ve seen in, ahem, Broomfield, local elections officials always know exactly what they’re doing.
7) With this legislation, special districts are exempted from regulation and don’t assign any rule-making authority by any state agency. If you’re like Wendy Davis’ supporters, who hate paraplegics, you wouldn’t have to make voting locations handicapped-compliant per the Americans with Disabilities law, for example.
6) The bill allows districts to use any kind of voting system they want – including those that are not tested, certified, or secure. Because, as we’ve seen in, ahem, Broomfield, local elections are always above board.
5) It doesn’t require signature verification. Why wouldn’t special districts, like school districts, want to verify signatures for mail-in ballots? We can’t imagine….
4) The bill doesn’t provide a system to check SCORE, which is how clerks know whether someone has voted more than once, so feel free to vote early and often. We’re kidding. We don’t advocate voter fraud. That’s the point of this post.
3) The bill removes penalties for falsifying registration. But, why wouldn’t we want voter fraud penalties? Wouldn’t that only be fair for people who abuse the system to be punished and deterred?
2) There are other ways to fix this bill; however, the Democrats refuse to play nice in the sandbox and allow any other option to move forward. Republican state Sen. Grantham introduced an option, but it was blocked by Democrats – so much for bipartisanship.
1) Even The Denver Post recently said this was being shoved through the legislature at an alarming pace, calling this “a terrible way to legislate”.