Civil & Human Rights

HB2305 Redux: Arizona Legislature Hell Bent on Suppressing Your Right to Vote

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by Pamela Powers Hannley

In the wee hours of the 2013 session of the Arizona Legislature, Republican legislators cobbled together several voter suppression initiatives that had gone no where and passed them (at the urging of House Speaker John Boehner) as an omnibus voter suppression bill (HB2305).

During the summer, outraged Arizonans collected 145,000 signatures to halt implementation of HB2305 until the people voted on it in 2014.

Hell bent on cheating their way into office… er… voter suppression,  a group of legislators now wants to circumvent a statewide vote on HB2305 by repealing HB2305 and re-introducing its component parts for potential passage in the 2014 session.

Below is a press release from the Protect Your Right to Vote Committee. It’s time to make some phone calls – especially to Ethan Orr (LD9)– and tell your representatives that if they want to pass a voter initiative it should be a bill that guarantees the right to vote– not a set of bills that will deny citizens their rights.

 

Presidential Commission on Election Administration releases its report

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The Presidential Commission on Election Administration has released its report, The American Voting Experience: Report and Recommendations of the Presidential Commission on Election Administration (.pdf).

Greg Sargent writes at the Washington Post, A step towards better elections:

[The Commission's] prescriptions are very likely to please voting reformers, though they probably will cite areas where the panel could have gone farther. The key recommendations are improved voter registration through online registration and interstate exchange of voter lists, to ensure accuracy and speed the process; expansion of early voting; and improved voting technology.

One of the most important things about the report is that it unabashedly identifies our voting difficulties as a national problem that requires a national solution. “We view the recommendations as broad-based solutions to common problems evident on a national scale,” the report says. “The recommendations in this report are targeted at common problems shared by all or most jurisdictions. For the most part, they are of a size that should fit all.”

The report does discuss some regional variations, but this is a clear declaration of the scope of the problem, and the required scope of the solution. Indeed, the report recommends the creation of a national standard: “no citizen should have to wait more than 30 minutes to vote.”

“Some had eschewed national solutions, or any kinds of efforts to fix these problems, by suggesting they’re so particular and local that they can’t be solved with national policy,” Wendy Weiser, the director of the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice, tells me. “This sets a national standard for judging our election performance against. Here is a bipartisan group with strong credibility from both parties, strongly putting their thumb on the scale for national solutions.”

CAP’s latest assault on the constitutional right of privacy in health care decisions of Arizona women

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

TalibanOn the opening day of the Arizona Legislature this year, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected Arizona's appeal from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals striking down the legislature's 20-week abortion ban as unconstitutional. The source of this anti-choice bill, Mullah Cathi Herrod and her Christian Taliban at the Center for Arizona Policy (CAP), vowed to retaliate against Arizona women. Arizona cannot enforce abortion ban, Supreme Court rules:

Herrod signaled that her organization, which has been at the forefront of pushing lawmakers here to enact more restrictions on abortion, is not done yet.

"We are already taking the next steps to protect women and their pre-born children from the dangerous and deadly practices of the abortion industry," she said, promising details in the coming days.

One of CAP's foot soldiers in the Arizona Legislature, Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-Peoria), is the sponsor of HB 2284 (.pdf) which would, among other provisions, allow for the Christian Taliban to make unannounced "inspections" of abortion clinics to harass and intimidate abortion service providers and their patients. The Arizona Capitol Times (subscription required) reports, Anti-abortion bill would permit unannounced inspections of clinics:

A Peoria lawmaker has introduced an anti-abortion bill that would allow health inspectors to examine clinics unannounced. The bill also would make it a crime to circumvent the state’s parental consent law.

The bill, HB 2284, introduced Thursday by Rep. Debbie Lesko, also requires abortion clinics to report whether an infant survived a procedure and what steps doctors took to save it.

The legislature’s attempt to defund Planned Parenthood before the U.S. Supreme Court

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

TalibanLast November the state of Arizona petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court for review of a 9th Circuit Court of Appeals decision striking down the Arizona legislature's attempt to defund Planned Parenthood of Arizona as a family planning service under Medicaid (AHCCCS) on the specious argument that it also separately provides for abortion services. Providing funding to the family planning services side of Planned Parenthood allegedly "indirectly" subsidizes the separately maintained and accounted for abortion services of Planned Parenthood.

State and federal law have long prohibited public funding of abortions, hence the separation of services and separate accounting by Planned Parenthood. Should the state of Arizona succeed on its specious claim, many areas of the state would lose family planning services because Planned Parenthood is the only provider in those areas. Planned Parenthood also provides wellness services for such things as cancer screening for cervical and breast cancers, and a host of other services. In effect, the Arizona legislature, at the behest of Mullah Cathi Herrod and her Christian Taliban at the Center for Arizona Policy (CAP), would deny low income Arizona women access to basic health care and family planning services.

The case is Tom Betlach, Director, Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System, et al., v. Planned Parenthood Arizona, Inc., et al. (Docket 13-621). A responsive brief was due on January 21, 2014.

Hedges: What Obama Really Meant on NSA Surveillance

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Posted by Bob Lord I received a little pushback on Debate on Snowden Over, So Why No Pardon? My only suggestion to those who don't see it my way is to check out Chris Hedges post today, What Obama Really Meant Was… The post, written as if Obama is the writer, is long, but awesome. It's … Read more