A top Justice Department official on Monday urged Congress to restore the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the civil rights-era law that helped secure voting rights for millions facing discriminatory obstacles.
Kristen Clarke, assistant attorney general of the DOJ Civil Rights Division, said during a House Judiciary election subcommittee hearing that “restoration of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) is a matter of great urgency” for the department.
“If the end of the twentieth century was a period of dramatic expansion in voting rights, the twenty-first century has, so far, been a period of rising attacks on voting rights,” Ms. Clarke said in her written testimony.
She told subcommittee members that there have been “cutbacks to early voting periods; imposition of additional requirements to cast ballots, either at polling places or with respect to absentee ballots; and new restrictions on the right of civic groups to assist citizens in participating fully in the electoral process.”
Ms. Clarke also criticized the Supreme Court’s 2013 decision in Shelby County v. Holder, which found part of the 1965 law was outdated and no longer relevant, including a section governing which states were discriminating against voters and the preclearance formula for deciding if state voting law changes must be subject to federal review.
The ruling, she said, removed the DOJ’s main tool to prevent racial discrimination in state voting laws.
Subcommittee member Rep. Jim Jordan disagreed, saying the high court’s decision “acknowledged the progress that this nation has made since the 1960s.”
The Ohio Republican said the Democrat-backed John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act (VRAA), which seeks to bring back the preclearance regime, is not “designed to fix Shelby County” rather it is “designed to radically change how we run elections and to politicize enforcement of the VRA.”
If passed, he said the VRAA would require jurisdictions to get “approval from unelected people in the Justice Department before changing its election process — that’s some scary stuff.”
“Despite the strides that the nation has taken, the Democrats would like to have you think that the Supreme Court has gutted the VRA and they say that that’s why it’s urgent to pass [VRAA], but the facts just don’t back that up,” he said.
The congressman pointed to other sections of the law which he said “remain effective tools to root out intentional discrimination where it might exist.”
Ms. Clarke, however, said the ruling has forced the Justice Department to bring case-by-case litigation that can cost millions and last for years, whereas the preclearance review would last for a few months, at most.
“The greater costs of protracted litigation also accrue to governmental entities defending against discrimination claims and are ultimately paid by taxpayers, who include those voters who have been discriminated against,” she said in her written testimony.
The original 1965 law envisioned a state’s preclearance authorization would last for five years.
Congress reauthorized the legislation several times, including most recently in 2006, when the GOP-controlled House and Senate approved a 25-year extension of preclearance.
States or counties looking to “bail out” of the scrutiny had to show they had no illegal voting practices, and did not fail any preclearance tests over the past 10 years.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., writing the majority opinion in 2013, said the formula was based on voting rights infractions incurred in the 1960s.
• Alex Swoyer can be reached at aswoyer@washingtontimes.com.
• Emily Zantow can be reached at ezantow@washingtontimes.com.
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