north carolina democratic governor roy cooper on friday vetoed legislation to implement a voter photo identification mandate added to the state's constitution in a recent referendum. 55% of voters approved a constitutional amendment last month requiring voter photo id.
"requiring photo ids for in-person voting is a solution in search of a problem. instead, the real election problem is votes harvested illegally through absentee ballots, which this proposal fails to fix," said cooper, referencing an investigation of alleged absentee ballot fraud in the state's ninth congressional district election in november.
cooper has repeatedly opposed voter id legislation over the years, saying it was unnecessary and would prevent many black, brown and poor citizens from exercising their right to cast ballots. republican leaders in the gop-dominated general assembly vowed late friday to override, a move some observers expect will lead to litigation.
the bill greatly expands the number of qualifying ids and exceptions compared to legislation blocked earlier this decade. permitted ids would include employee id cards for state and local governments, student ids from colleges and universities, and traditional driver's licenses and military id.
there also would be a new, free, photo voter identification card produced by county election boards. people having trouble obtaining an id could fill out forms at the polling site, and their ballots would likely be counted, too.
federal judges struck down a 2013 state law including photo voter id and other voting restrictions. the judges ruled the law was approved with intentional racial discrimination in mind.
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