Podcast Recap: How States Can Restore Voter Confidence
- BY FGA
The 2020 election was unlike any other. Ballot harvesting, billionaires funding election offices, and other political antics, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, raised concerns among voters about the integrity of our elections.
Many states are working to address these problems and make elections more secure and transparent. In 2021, 14 states enacted election integrity reforms, but there is still more work to be done.
Senior Fellow Madeline Malisa recently joined the Foundation for Government Accountability’s Built to Win podcast to discuss what state legislators can do to restore voter confidence.
More from this episode of the Built to Win podcast:
“State lawmakers have been very busy this session across the country and they’re working hard to restore voter confidence in the election process in their states. And as we know, if confidence drops, participation drops, and that’s the cornerstone of our democracy. So really, when people don’t trust the process, they don’t trust the outcome, and they don’t trust their elected officials.”
“Many states also don’t have ID requirements with absentee ballots like they do in person… Georgia just recently passed a requirement that voters must show a state ID or driver’s license number or Social Security number… they put that number on their absentee ballot. This creates uniformity in the process, but also it increases the verification for absentee voters, that they actually are who they say they are.”
“Imagine private funding of more police stops, but only in certain neighborhoods, or private funding for tax departments to conduct more audits on a certain type of business or in a certain ZIP Code or of a certain political persuasion. Elections should be safeguarded from this type of outside influence.”
“Voters want to know when they’re voting that it’s a free, fair, and valid election.”
