As citizens of a democracy, the right to vote is the most important right we have because it is the right that guarantees all others. I believe that barriers to voting are unacceptable. During my first term in Congress, I introduced a number of legislative measures aimed at fostering greater voter participation.
In May 2008, I introduced the Election Day Registration Act (H.R. 5946), legislation that would significantly increase voter participation by mandating election-day registration nationwide. Same day registration has been Minnesota state law for over thirty years and has made the state a national leader in voter turnout.
This is a resource to hear what happened at our August 24, 2009 Town Hall Forum on Town Hall Forum on Access to Transportation Jobs & Contracts. The runtime is just under 2 hours.
Participants included:
Congressman Ellison
Bernie Arseneau - MNDOT
Kathleen Meyer - Meyer Contracting
Bobby Joe Champion - Minnesota State House, District 58-B
Richard Copeland - THOR Construction
Rev. Jerry McAfee - Minnesota State Baptist Convention
I am the proud sponsor of the Voter Access Protection Act (H.R. 4026), a bill to ban the use of photo identification as a requirement for voting in federal elections. I believe that this requirement disenfranchises hundreds of thousands of voters, particularly senior citizens, women, young people, minority voters and low-income individuals. Minnesota’s thirty-year history with same day voter laws proves that photo identification is not necessary to ensure secure and reliable elections.
I authored the Make Provisional Ballots Count Act (H.R. 5628). Currently there are many different procedures for how provisional ballots are collected and counted. Consequently, nearly one in three provisional ballots cast in the 2004 election were never counted. This legislation sets one federal standard for provisional ballots and establishes a specific counting process that states must follow to ensure that every legal vote is counted.
