Whether its a grandmother who cant register to vote because she cant find her birth certificate, College Students prevented from registering to vote in the place where they go to school, or even malfunctioning Voting Machines that lead to long lines and voters who need to get back to work. So they have to give up and leave the line. Certainly, we have seen that over and over again. 2016 was the first president ial election in half a century where the full Voting Rights act was not in effect. Since the Supreme Courts 2013 Shelby County decision striking down a key section in the Voting Rights act, we have seen a lot of action on the state and local level. And while some states and local communities have improved access to voting, others have restricted it. Often by targeting poor people and minority communities. We have seen numerous Voter Suppression laws passed. A number of which have been struck down by the courts for being discriminatory. Earlier this year, the Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal on North Carolinas strict voter i. D. Law. Which was struck down as we know, last year by the fourth u. S. Circuit court of appeals. In its decision, the Fourth Circuit said the law would target africanamericans with almost surgical precision. But we cant just count on the courts doing the right thing. Thats why Senate Democrats continue to call for a proactive, legislative agenda to increase the opportunity for people to exercise their right to vote. In our country. Our members have introduced legislation on election security, expanding Voter Registration, creating more opportunities for voters to cast their ballots. Chief among our proposals is the Voting Rights advancement act, sponsored by my colleague, senator leahy. Co sponsored by nearly the entire Senate Democratic caucus. Meanwhile, the Trump Administration continues to promote the unfounded narrative of widespread voter fraud with its socalled Election Integrity commission. And its attempts to acquire a vast amount of personal information on american voters. Protecting Voting Rights should be bipartisan. I think all of us feel that way. It should be a nobrainer. It should be bipartisan. And thats why im very disappointed the republicans in congress have refused to hold any hearings on updating the Voting Rights act and on the state of Voting Rights in america. And thats why were here doing our own hearing. Senate democrats will continue to do all we can to protect the right to vote for tens of millions of americans, and to find ways to eliminate restrictions on voting. I look forward to hearing from our terrific expert Witnesses Today. I know its going to be a very productive discussion. All of my colleagues care deeply about this, and our leaders in their states. And all of you are true leaders in the fight to protect and strengthen the right to vote in our democracy. Were honored to have you taking the time to be with us today. Now id like to turn to my colleague from minnesota, senator amy klobuchar, who is the Ranking Member on Senate Rules Committee to say a few words. Thank you, very much, senator stab know. Thank you for your advocacy. Unfortunately, the rules committee hasnt had any hearings this year. So im glad that you are willing to have this discussion about what is happening with voting. We have seen, as senator stab no noted and the court has said succinctly efforts to discriminate with surgical precision. Threehour lines in arizona. 100 miles to the nearest polling station in nevada and utah. Photo i. D. Requirements in wisconsin, where we now know it can really be hard to get an i. D. In the first place. This isnt just going on in one state. This is a systematic effort across our country. And what does the administration do . They make things worse by establishing the socalled commission on Election Integrity. This is not about integrity when you look at what theyre doing. And, in fact, can make things worse by trying to gather information that Many Republican secretary of states have spoken out against in a location, in one location we try to avoid. Decentralized Voting Systems. I dont think that was an accident, either. They are just simply making people concerned approximate voting, and we have heard in some states like colorado that people actually took away their own registrations, because they didnt want to have their data shared. Solutions . Well, sameday registration. I know that minnesota had the highest voter turnout. I know that the honorable natalie tenent knows this. But we had the highest voter turnout last year of any state, and consistently are in the top one or two. Thats because we have sameday registration. I have a bill to do that nationally with senator tester and others. And then also, automatic registration. A bill im introducing last week that would require automatic voting registration state by state for eligible voters when they turn 18. These are not radical proposals. These are proposals that we should all support, whether were democrats, republicans or independents, because our democracy is founded on one simple principle. That citizens get to participate. And we should be making it easier to participate. And not harder. Thank you. Thank you very much. Weve also asked senator jean shaheen to make some opening statements. There was a hearing in New Hampshire last week. Both senator shaheen and senator maggi hassen, i know, were a part of this. And we would like very much to get an update, senator shaheen. Well, thank you, senator stab now. And thank you for convening this hearing. Actually, we had hoped to be a part of that, but, in fact, they refused to allow us to have our testimony read as part of the commission. You know, the fact is, the Trump Administrations president ial Advisory Commission on Election Integrity, thats sort of orwellian. The Pence Commission, is what i call it, held a hearing in New Hampshire last week and it did exactly the opposite. It further misled americans and granite staters about the integrity of our electoral process. And i think as many here would agree, that president trumps baseless assertions about Illegal Immigrants and illegal voting in the 2016 election really has zero evidence to support them. The vice chair of that commission did a column in breitbart where he made allegations about our election in New Hampshire in 2016, the election of senator hassan, and hillary clinton, who won the New Hampshire electoral vote. And said that we allowed outofstaters to vote. He clearly did not understand our election laws, and he was corrected by both the secretary of state of New Hampshire and maine. What we have seen is that the real objective of this commission is to lay the ground work for Voter Suppression laws. And we saw that at the hearing last week in New Hampshire. The people testifying before that panel recommended things like thumb prints on vote i. D. S, criminal background checks before people would be allowed to register to vote. And i think one of the important points to point out to people is that americans lose trust in their elections when politicians question the validity of those elections without evidence. And, you know, we had a hearing earlier today in the Foreign Relations committee, and jon huntsman, who has been nominated to be ambassador to russia, was it was on his nomination. And we talked about the russian interference in our elections in 2016. And he said something that i think is really important. Speaks to what happens when elected officials undermine our process. He said and i thought this was so important to repeat for me, as a former governor, youre tasked with the integrity of your election system. Sometimes you have nothing more important than the integrity of your election process at the localist of levels. And to work to undercut or subvert or sow seeds of doubt is the highest level of injury that can be laid on a local election system. So i thought governor huntsman said that very well. And it points to the fact that we cannot overstate the dangers that lie in spreading this kind of misinformation. The Pence Commission and its motives are not to investigate voter fraud. Theyre to intimidate voters, particularly students, minority voters, lowincome voters, to sway them from participating in our electoral process. So thank you to all the witnesses who are here today for helping us to shed light on what the real intent of this administration is. Thank you very much, senator shaheen. I know that senator wyden was going to be with i think he will be at some point. He wants to speak to his bill vote by mail act, as well. And we certainly look forward to that. But were going to turn now to very, very important guests that are with us. Sherry lynn ivel is the president of the naacp Legal Defense fund. The naacp Legal Defense fund through its litigation and advocacy has worked tirelessly to expand democracy and eliminate racial disparities. Welcome. Benita gupta is the president of the Leadership Conference on civil and human rights. Promotes and protects civil and human rights of all people in the United States. Ms. Gupta was the former head of the Civil Rights Division at the department of justice. Reverend doctor wendell anthony, my great friend from detroit, who heads the who is president of the Detroit Branch of the naacp. Are we still the largest chapter . I believe we are, yes. And i know we have the largest annual dinner, of which you are all welcome to attend over at any given time 12 to 14,000 people at a sitdown dinner. And the food is always hot. I still have not figured this out. As we do this. But its a powerful dinner. Powerful dinner. And reverend anthony is a respected civil rights leader in detroit and southeastern michigan and in our country. And he has seen firsthand the effects of what voter en franchisement can do. We have pleased to have you with us as president and general counsel of the mexican and American Defense Legal Education fund. Through your litigation and advocacy work, he has been working to secure access to the voting booths for all citizens. And last but not least, natalie tenent. Natalie is a former West Virginia secretary of state, and manager of state advocacy on the Brennen Centers Voting Rights and elections project. During her tenure as secretary, she emerged as a leader on election modernization. So as you can tell, we have a terrific panel, and well start with ms. Eiffel. Thank you. Thank you [ inaudible ] there we go. Thank you chairwoman stab now, for convening this meeting and to share my views and to all of the senators who thought it was important to be here for this discussion. In my brief statement, id like to provide context for our discussion today, and to explain why the current moment demands urgent congressional action to restore the full protections of the Voting Rights act, but also to address the issues that we heard in the introduction from senator stab i now. The threat to a core and central piece of our democracy. And that is the right to vote. The ability to participate in the political process. The organization i lead, the naacp Legal Defense fund, has been on the front lines for the in the fight for equal Voting Rights since its founding in 1940, one of our earliest successes was challenging the allwhite democratic primary in texas in 1944, smith versus all right. And since that time, we have continued until today working on this urgent issue that we regard as central to the full citizenship of africanamericans. After the violent acts of domestic terror in charlottesville, americans have started a National Conversation about White Supremacy. I dont think ive heard the word White Supremacy as much in my life as ive heard it over the last month. And i think thats a good thing. That conversation is long overdue. Its been somewhat encouraging. Political leaders of both parties have roundly rebuked White Supremacy as a repugnant force that must be eradicated from american life. Last week, Congress Approved a measure condemning White Supremacists and calling on the Justice Department to investigate and prosecute hate groups who ferment racial violence. Those responses are appropriate and welcome but incomplete. We cannot have a full conversation about White Supremacy in this country without also talking about the right to vote. And we cannot fully defeat White Supremacy unless Congress Acts to ensure that statesponsored discrimination is not a barrier between voters of color and the polls. The truth is that intimidation and disenfranchisement of black voters has always been central to american White Supremacy for decades. States and local jurisdictions suppressed votes with taxes, literacy tests and needlessly confusing registration requirements. Today they use strict voter i. D. Laws. Proof of citizenship requirements and racial gerrymandering. Its the same discrimination in different forms. A federal court in texas recognized as much when it found that the states voter i. D. Law constitutes a constitutional poll tax. And that decision is just one of many. Since 2014, there have been at least ten federal Court Decisions finding that states or local governments intentionally discriminated against africanamericans and other voters of color when enacting legislation. This is a watershed moment in this country. That means legislatures and county councils convening and passing laws for the purpose of dis disfranchising american voters. I submitted the full list. It includes cases from texas, louisiana, wisconsin, North Carolina, including the Fourth Circuits decision that was referred to earlier. We add to this, of course, the president s socalled Election Integrity commission thats already been discussed. Its the subject of seven lawsuits. And we add to it also the attorney general, Jeff Sessions, who has pulled back on the prosecution of proven intentional discrimination in voting. We are witnessing a kind of perfect storm of Voter Suppression in which perhaps for the first time the federal government through this Election Integrity commission and the attorney general are also openly hostile to Voting Rights and is actively supporting Voter Suppression. The federal courts are taking their time deciding these cases and the states, of course, doing what the Reconstruction Congress knew they would do when they used the language in the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments, no state shall or states are prohibited from. The framers of those amendments not only put limits on state conduct that would undermine full citizenship of africanamericans, they included enforcement clauses in each of the civil war amendments, entrusting you, congress, with the authority to enforce the rights that were to give full citizenship to africanamericans. In 1965, a Bipartisan Congress responded with a Voting Rights act which for nearly 50 years was the most effective civil rights statute in our nations history. But now we need so much more. We need the Voting Rights act to be restored. We need the array of legislation that many of you have sponsored that will expand voting. We need your oversight of the department of justice. We need you to look closely at the Election Integrity commission and the appropriations for that commissions work. And we need you to speak regularly, loudly, clearly, about the importance of the right to vote for every american. Thank you. Thank you very much, ms. Gupta. Welcome. Great, thank you so much, chairman, and all of you for convening this very important event. Im really honored to be here today. I am the president , ceo on civil and human rights, a coalition of more than 200 national organizations, and we were founded in 1950, and have coordinated all the national lobbying efforts on almost every piece of major civil rights legislation since 1957, including the 1965 Voting Rights act. Voting rights are today just under assault, plain and simple. I think there is no question. And you heard, obviously, everyone knows about the devastating Shelby County decision and the North Carolina and texas courts speaking clearly about the intentional race discrimination of those laws and ten Voting Rights decisions that federal courts have said they found intentional discrimination post shelby in the way that states reacted in enacting restrictive voting laws. So i dont want to get into that. But i do want to focus on something thats personally very heart breaking for me to witness, which is the sessions Justice Departments retreat from the Justice Departments historic, and i would say bipartisan commitment to aggressive Voting Rights enforcement. It has always been an aggressive area of bipartisan enforcement in the past. In february, the Justice Department reversed a longstanding litigating position with the texas voter i. D. Law, was intentionally racially discriminatory. Thankfully, federal courts continue to uphold that finding, despite the justices change in position. In june on the very same day that the decision was announced, the Civil Rights Division sent an unprecedented letter. It was never before done to 44 states asking for extensive information on how states maintain their rolls in what appears to be a prelude to voting purge efforts. And in august, the Justice Department filed a brief with the Supreme Court in the Institute Case reversing its position of very longstanding position arguing that it should be easier for states to remove registered voters from their rolls. And then we have, as you all know, and we have talked about, president trumps socalled Advisory Commission on Election Integrity. Which is really set up to investigate the president s rather absurd allegations that millions have voted illegally in the 2016 election. We know that the real reason the commission was created was to restrict the right to vote. And the commissions membership tells you all that you need to know from chris co vac and hans petition koski to other commissioners to have devoted their careers to conspiracy theories about mass voter fraud. And, in fact, just last week, hans was recently identified as the sender of an email to the Justice Department originally before the formation of this commission urging that no democrats or, quote, mainstream republicans be permitted to serve on the commission. This is now plain and simple for everyone to see. The commissions attempt to create a National Database of censoring voter information should alarm any of us who value privacy and security and the integrity of our elections and thats why you saw so many secretaries of state speak out. Working handinhand with other civil rights organizations, we have mounted a nationwide effort to discredit this commission and urged that congress deny appropriations to the sham commission, and we appreciate the efforts that many of you are making to pursue that strategy. It also, though, cuts the president s anti Voting Rights crusade cuts across his agenda. His nominations all demonstrate the administrations commitment to thwarting full access to the franchise. Tomorrow the Senate Judiciary committee is holding a hearing for thomas far of North Carolina, who has had a long historying of defending Voter Suppression efforts and we urge the senators to oppose his confirmation. But we know its not enough to play defense. There are a number of pieces of legislation that the Leadership Conference coalition has been vocally in support of from the Voter Empowerment act to the restoration act to the automatic registration act where we in the states as you said, have seen a lot of momentum, bipartisan momentum, and somehow in congress were only seeing democratic sponsorship, and we hope that will change. Along with these measures, we need a fully funded 2020 census. Its among the most significant civil rights issues we face today. Accurate census data is essential to insuring fair and prorgs National Voting representation for all americans, and we are working hard to ensure that there is a fair appropriations, especially to ensure historically undercounted populations are counted where there is such fear among immigrant communities in particular right now. And then we urge, finally, for congress to exercise and coastly monitor coming out of the Justice Department. And we hope that also youll find ways to ensure timely responses to really [ inaudible ] letters. We know that Voting Rights has to transcend partisanship and we are there behind you to do everything we can in the long haul fight to ensure that everyones right to vote is protected. So thank you. Thank you very much. Reverend anthony, welcome. Thank you, senator. And let me thank all of you for being here and for calling this hearing. I think one of the prime benefits of this hearing is the fact that youre holding it. One of the reasons people are not voting is because they do not have hope. They do not believe that their votes are making any differences. Because of the fact of what we see happening nationally today. Years ago, the great Freedom Fighter was speaking in upstate new york. While she was speaking, an elderly white gentleman in the rear end said to her, oh, woman, what youre saying to me means about as much to me as that of a flea buzzing around the rear end of an elephant. So she looked at the gentleman and said oh, man, you might not like my buzzing, but im guaranteed to keep you scratching. It is important that we continue to keep the proverbial offense scratching today. We are here to keep the elephant scratching because of the foes of Voting Rights and people empowerment. They must itch from our persistent and determined efforts to eliminate barriers to voting booths. We must expose the illegitimate schemes designed to frustrate peoples will and right to vote. It is important to remember and reflect upon the fact that we see what we see on our national level. One is not inspired by what we see. As a matter of fact, it has a very opposite significance. They do not inspire the people, they depress the people. In my own state just last year, the state legislature had a law that would have required stateapproved photo identification. Any individual who did not have it would have been required to bring i. D. To their local Clerks Office within ten days of the election. Failure to do so would have resulted in the disqualification of the voter, and thus would, in fact, nullify the vote. If hard enough to get folks to stand in line to vote. So theyre not going to come back ten days after an election to prove that they did vote. Its implementation would have resulted in many citizens in the Africanamerican Community, students and seniors, not being eligible to vote, based on finances and travel to secure identification that was acceptable to the state. That bill was beat back by the pressure of the people, and it was put off the table. There are still a hunger racist hunger to bring it back and bring other bills like that to the table. This socalled 13member independent citizens commission, the socalled Election Protection or Integrity Commission that was instituted by the president , to us is no more than one of the biggest scams that we have ever seen in the u. S. Political history. The fact that this committee is composed of all those persons, quite frankly, for the most part, kris kobach, hans, ken blackwell, Jay Christian adams, folks like bill gardner from New Hampshire, who in New Hampshire have gone and senator shaheen knows recently just had this law that basically is going to suppress some of the young people, students and disadvantaged by exercising their right to vote as a result of making it more difficult for them to get to the polls. It is important that as the founder of take your souls to the polls from michigan that we consistently have and update and do engage in the Voting Rights advancement act of 2017. Designed to repair, restore and strengthen the Voting Rights act of 1965. We urge the house and senate to endorse and support hr2978 and s1419. Among those, other things we believe is important to update to cover states with a historical pattern practicing discrimination. Guarantee that no lastminute voting change will adversely affect voters. Enhance the ability to apply preclearance review when needed. Support legislation and local communities that would allow the rejoin of district lines for communities to ensure the Political Representation and eliminate gerrymandering. We have an initiative right now in michigan that is structured to put a bill on the ballot that would allow us to redraw the district lines, not by the politicians, but by the local community folk. Increase sameday registration. The use of social media must become a major priority. Text messaging, texting your vote. Facebook, take a look at your vote. Snapchat, snap your fingers and vote. Twitter. Your vote is but a tweet away. Instagram. You can instantly change your own future. Increase funds for updating equipment and training for states and local communities. There was a recent audit where a state was accused of having some voter fraud. The audit found there was no fraud, there was outdated machines, that there was training that needed to occur. We suggest we have a National Holiday for national elections, providing more time for Voter Participation. Increase time to participate in early and absentee voting. There must be a renewed effort implemented within our educational system to teach the benefits and responsibilities of participation in the American Democratic process. The structure about government and the ability to participate in electoral process should be taught, beginning in elementary through the high school. The emphasis must not be placed on Political Party or ideology, but on responsibility and civic duty. Were reminded on the words of alexis who said generations ago, the greatness of america lies not in being more enlightened than any other nation but rather her ability to repair her thoughts. Its time to repair our thoughts. Thank you. Thank you very much, reverend anthony, for those comments. Mr. Signs. Good to have you with us. Thank you, senator. And thank you, all of you, for conducting this critically important hearing at this time. The mission is to promote the civil rights of all latinos living in the United States. We will celebrate our 50th anniversary next year in 2018. From almost the very beginning of our organizations existence, focusing on the vote and securing access to the ballot and Fair Election systems have been top priorities. We join our colleagues in condemning the Election Integrity commission, which was born out of Donald Trumps scurrilous mythology about illegal voting, fraudulent voting in the 2016 election. That like many of these allegations, focused on the Latino Community. Because of the actual and projected growth of the Latino Community, too often our community is the target of attempts to suppress votes either through restricting access to the ballot or registration or through election systems that deprive the community of a meaningful vote. So we join in condemning the commission and urge you to look at its funding and urge you to look at its bias, and urge you to ensure that it cannot engage in the intimidation it seems designed to create. I have in the past characterized this commission as an area 51 commission. Because voter fraud is about as common as documented ufo sightings in this country. But today id like to focus on the Latino Communitys experience after Shelby County. And in particular, with the lack of preclearance coverage of the entire state of texas, the entire state of arizona, and portions of california. We have had to redouble our efforts to challenge election systems and Ballot Access provisions that restrict the rights of latinos. In some cases, we have had to leave the pursuit of litigation against texas voter i. D. , for example, to our very capable colleagues. But our own lack of participation, because we had to direct our efforts elsewhere, has affected the overall goal of preserving Voting Rights. I will give you one example of what we have faced. The city of pasadena, texas, very shortly, after the Shelby County decision was announced, decided through its mayor to change its structure of government. From a city council consisting of eight members elected from districts, to a structure of six members elected from districts and two elected at large. It undertook that change pretty clearly to prevent the growing Latino Community, which was on the cusp of electing a majority of the distributed Council Members from controlling the city council. We had to challenge that change successfully. But only through a very arduous and expensive pretrial preparation, experts and all the rest and a lengthy trial. In the end, the judge concluded that there was not only a dill utilize active unlawful effect on the latino vote but that the change was intended to have that effect on the Latino Community in pasadena, texas. It resulted in what we believe to be the first contested bailin order subjecting a jurisdiction to preclearance in the future. My point is, it took much work and cost to achieve that, and for one small city, in texas. Prior to Shelby County, we relied heavily on the deterrent effect of preclearance, not just in coverage jurisdictions but uncovered jurisdictions, as well, which paid attention to what electoral changes were blocked by department of justice or the dc federal court, and paid attention to the changes that were required through the preclearance review before attempting to make similar changes in their own jurisdictions. We no longer have that deterrent effect. It affects not only maldef, but one of the frequently uncited beneficiaries, and thats the taxpayers of the defendant jurisdictions. Preclearance saved those defendant jurisdictions literally billions of dollars over the course of the time preclearance was in effect. Why . Because without preclearance, they would have been subject to litigation, and in the end, when they lose, they would be subject not only to paying their own lawyers and experts, but the other sides, as well. So i urge you and to urge your colleagues to see the civil the preclearance provisions, not simply as they have been accurately described civil rights provision ever written into federal law, but also as one of the first and most effective alternative dispute Resolution Systems ever written in federal law. Its one of the unexplained ironies of policy making today that some of those who embrace adr in the context of consumers and employment are not supporting adr when it comes to the vote. In fact, like adr, preclearance saved billions of dollars for the jurisdictions that would otherwise be the targets of litigation and would ultimately have to pay not only their own cost, but the other sides, as well. We need this adc mechanism reintroduced and we urge you to support a new formula to apply preclearance across the board. Thank you very much. And welcome, natalie tenent. Madam secretary. Thank you so much, senator. I appreciate being here. And i appreciate all of you for the invitation and having this hearing and this meeting, as well. As you know, im the former secretary of state of West Virginia, where i took very seriously my job of expanding Voting Rights for the citizens of West Virginia. And i did it with a forwardthinking approach. And now i have that opportunity to continue working on those initiatives at the Brennen Center for justice out of nyu school of law. And ill be joined today by my colleague, Nicole Austin hillary, with whom many of you work. And so as we talk about some of these initiatives and the concerns, obviously, that we have, what can be done. I want to share some examples with you, just a piece of what we did in West Virginia. West virginia had early voting back in 2002. In 2009, we implemented satellite voting, or community voting. And it was during the early voting period, and it expanded voting opportunities. And many people now refer to them across the country as vote centers. Well, what they do is, they allow county Election Officials to offer additional early voting locations away from the primary courthouse locations. And so for rural counties, where its a 45minute to an hour drive to your county seat, this obviously offers muchneeded accessibility and convenience. And a voter from a precinct can go into the center, be given the appropriate ballot and then votes it. So early voting reduces the stress on the Voting System on election day. It alleviates administrative burdens and reduces voter frustration. Also in West Virginia, we modernize the election process through online Voter Registration that upgraded the outdated paperbased systems and increased convenience, because it took Voter Registration to where people are. On their phones, on their digital and their handheld devices, as the reverend was talking about. Automatic Voter Registration is a common sense, bipartisan approach that we passed in West Virginia in 2016. Now, with avr, eligible citizens who interact with Government Agencies are registered to vote, unless they choose to decline. And the agencies then transfer the Voter Registration information electronically to Election Officials. So what this does, it makes for a seamless process thats more convenient, less errorprone for both voters and for government officials. And its an easy, simple, yet Effective Technology solution that is possible to protect Voting Rights by making sure that were eliminating errors in registration. Registration. This innovative policy that the Brennan Center developed more than a decade ago boost Voter Registration, it cleans the roles, it makes it easier to vote, reduces the potential for voter fraud, all the while saving money. So why is it so important to get people to register today vote . Pretty simple question. Not only does it get them to the polls but this is the true beginning of voter engagement, because think about it, when someone is registered to vote, they begin to see receive election mailings whether they are voter guidelines, voter guides, sample ballots from their state or local Election Officials oor information from candidates and organizations themselves. They are now a more informed electorate. With registered voters, resources are shifted from Voter Registration drives to get out the vote efforts that encourage voters to participate and thats means theres more interaction also. An example of that can be going door to door and knocking on doors and engaging voters where they live on their front porch. It allows that and from an administrative standpoint, Election Officials have a steadier stream of people who are registering rather than that huge crush at the end, at the deadline of Voter Registration and that crush can cause mistakes, overworked employees, the need for temp workers and frustrated voters. Mad am chairman, there are ways to defend and expand the rights of eligible americans and we at the Brennan Center as always are ready to work and assist in any way that we can do, so im looking forward to this discussion that were having and ill be willing to take questions also. Thank you again for the invitation. Thank you very much to all of you and youll have an opportunity to ask questions. Im, first, though going to turn to a moment to senator wyden. I spoke about your vote by mail act before you were here but you have been such a leader on this we want to give you a moment to speak about that. Thank you. Just as a deference to my colleagues waiting so long, ill going to keep this real brief and open up a couple of matters for the record. I do want as a chair as indicated to give everybody in america the chance to vote by mail. Weve had this now for a fair number of years in our state. This empowers voters, we havent had problems with fraud. Its efficient. And much of the countrys already going to this. We dont have excuse voting and all this kind of thing in a lot of places. So what we say in this legislation, i think there are 19 senators who are now cosponsors of the bill. Its for every federal election, eligible voters would receive a ballot in the mail. The federal government covers the cost of mailing ballots to registered voters through the postal service. States can keep their polling places if they wish, but states that choose to do an entirely vote by mail system, in my view, are going to see their costs drop significantly and states that keep their Polling Centers would produce a paper ballot so that voters again have a paper trail for what theyre doing. And i think because i want to be sensitive to my colleagues who have been waiting so long, id just like to ask for two of you to answer questions for the record so i dont interrupt my colleagues, ms. Tenant youve been doing good work on mail and Voter Registration, it would be helpful to have in your writing, your views on how voting by mail an automatic registration helps to reverse the kind of Voter Suppression efforts that we have seen in the past. Hell give that to you in writing. Youre doing very good work. Same with respect to you ms. Gupta. One of the other hats that i wear and the cybersecurity people we talked with all recommend in connection with this general kind of topic of improving ways to have people vote, vote by mail to have risk limiting audits of elections, my understanding is that in the past you have been interested in routine audits to promote Public Confidence and trust in our elections and in the interest of time, if both of you could just take those questions, get it to chair in writing, we really appreciate your good work and well get you the questions in writing because ive seen you wondering if you remember everything i said. Colleagues who have been gracious to let me just barge in when youve been waiting, my thanks to all of you. Thank you very much for your great work in this area. Im going to ask reverend anthony, in the community on the ground, what changes have you seen in terms of access to voting and whats the tangible specific things that we need to be doing to make sure more people have the access to vote . Weve talked about online voting and vote by mail and other things, but thinking of the very basic things about equipment and machines and the kinds of things, what have you seen . Thanks, senator. Some of the fundamental things are equipment update. There needs to be an increase in funds to provide current equipment in greater numbers. The polls need to be expanded relative to people being able to access their polls in their local communities. The issue of funding for training, more funds need to be applied for training relative to poll workers and updating that kind of of a thing and the other thing is this, senator, the issue of jerry mandering districts is very potent. Thats real. We have found that even in the state of michigan, certain people are outvoting the other folks, but because of the way the district lines have been drawn, the votes are diluted. Michigan is one of the worst states in terms of the evidence of jerry mandering that weve seen. North carolina is up there and a whole bunch of other but michigan can wave its own flag. Weve been doing some work with folks in terms of the ballot proposal that i mentioned but i think that even if we are able to increase the vote, which we are working on, the way the lines are drawn it makes it difficult to win elections, because they have been rat packed and stacked against local communities. The training, the equipment, the time period for early voting, same day Voter Registration and Voter Participation, those are some tangible things that i think we can do and need to do, not only in detroit and michigan but all across the country. The other thing is empowering our young people, detroit naacp does a tremendous job in reaching out to young people and so on. When we look at what we need to be doing to engage and empower young people to register and to vote, what would you suggest . I think social media has got to be employed much more so than it is and i try to speak to that, you know, respectful of my colleagues as the senator was, the older more mature Community Goes to facebook. The younger more progressive energetic Community Goes to twitter, snapchat, instagram, thats where theyre at, and so thats how were going to capture many of them thats why i mentioned things like text messaging, texting your vote, facebook take a look at your votes, snapchat, these are programs. Snap your fingers and vote. Twitter, your vote is but a tweet away. Instagram, you can instantly change your own future. Those are the social media approach has to be employed. And theres originator of taking your souls to the polls and that was is a program that goes doortodoor knocking, door knockers on the porch conversations, we use social media but now were increasing that because the way you get to them is to go where theyre at. Theyre not coming to you. You got to go to them and the way you go to them is where they live. They live on the cell phones. They live on this medium so i think that if the democratic Voting Committee and your commission is going to make any Significant Impact it has to be in the area of social media and it has to be in the area of what does this mean for me . How does this improve and affect my life personally . I think thats the message we need to drive. Thank you very much. Ms. Gupta, turning to the back to the subject of the socalled Election Integrity commission, could you speak a little more about the biggest concerns about the extensive amount of information, the kinds of information that is being asked for in terms of voter records and peoples individual information and why thats concerning. Sure. Originally when for initial inquiries went out, they were asking for such wide data including Social Security numbers and data that is incredible violent of peoples privacy, its why you saw in colorado, thousands of people deregistering, we dont know the full number across the country of people who have already deregistered out of concern that their data is going to be kept in a centralized warehouse in the white house now on a computer. And so there is a lot of concern about how the state is getting collected and how it will be kept. One of the things we need to focus on is, while some of this data is publicly available and states absolutely have the right to share that data, the concern is what happens with that data once its been once its been collected. Chris covac has long had a program called crosscheck where he under the name of stopping mass voter purge is trying to cross compare to ensure there arent double voters or people voting twice and while thats obviously a noble cause, that database has an extremely high error rate. So much so that states like oregon and florida took themselves out of that database because of the error rate and the danger is that whatever database gets collected, that it will then be used as grounds to purge voters unlawfully off the roles without sufficient checks and guard rails around that. That letter went out without any guard rails about how that data could be used or stored, who would have access to it and in an age where were so deeply concerned about hacking into our election, having the centralized database on a white house computer certainly does not aswaj those concerns, its why you saw people like general mckenzie write an op ed about the National Security dangers of this. I think theres a lot of concerns right now about how this data is going to be collected and used. Thank you very much. I was turning to the senator some of the other colleagues are welcome to go. Thank you very much and senator hassan is next. Thank you, senator. Thank you all for being here and for the work that you do. Voting is our most essential and fundamental right and we have to do everything we can to protect that right. And i am as discouraged as the next person about what we have seen from this administration and from the Pence Commission but i am really proud to be standing with all of you in this fight and with my colleagues in the senate and throughout the country. I wanted to turn back for a moment to the events in New Hampshire last week when the Pence Commission came to my state. We heard some very troubling testimony at that commission meeting, including a proposal to consider using background check system we use for gun purchases as a way of screening voters but even more disturbing were suggestions that when burdens like poll taxes and literacy tests were in place, voter turnout was far higher than it is now. To be clear, poll taxes and literacy tests were among the tools used in the jim crow eratto pro prevent minorities from voting and they work because they kept turnout very low among black voters in the south. Fortunately we have outlawed this in the south between 1964 and 2012. You spoke about poll taxes and literacy tests in your testimony. Could you expand a bit on how the very misguided version of history that we heard at the Pence Commission in New Hampshire last week distorts the reality of how Voter Suppression operates and about how new Voter Suppression tools are also aimed at reducing turnouts among certain populations such as minorities and young people. Thank you, senator. One of the most zis turbing things about the Pence Commission is its extraordinary cynicism which was fully on display in New Hampshire last week, the idea that poll taxes and literacy tests somehow improved or increased Voter Participation turns history on its head. Both poll taxes and literacy tests were Voter Suppression tools of the 1950s and 60s and they were designed to ensure that africanamericans could not register to vote and participate in the political process. They were very effective in doing so. The elimination of these tests and the recognition of these tests as Voter Suppression barriers were really centered around a very important reality and that is that voting is the expression of citizenship in this country and that citizenship does not to be able to pay to vote, citizenship does not require one to be lit rit or even literate to a certain level. Citizenship comes with the fact that you are either born or naturalized in this country. And to attach any conditions on to citizenship for the purpose of exercising the right to vote, violates that fundamental truth and what we see today since the shelby decision with the kind of voter i. D. Laws, ironically, doing the background check is so fascinating that is used for guns, is really extraordinary, it actually marries together two things that are deeply prenutritious, it marries together our broken criminal Justice System which affects africanamerican and latinos, attempting essentially to use the overcriminalization that is visited on africanamericans and in africanamerican communities as yet another means to dis disenfranchise voters and its also true that this has the effect of doing precisely what we heard about earlier which is there is something happening with this commission that i think requires greater urgency and its why this hearing is so important. Every day this commission continues, a sense of sin mix and insecurity within the public who you want to come out and vote. Every day that the government is allowed to collect this information, hold this information on a server in the white house, use private emails to share this information, make the kind of ahistorical claims that you describe, openly and notoriously and continue its work, we just get up and go on the next day, the message is being sent to africanamericans, many of whom lived through the civil rights movement, who lived through this era in which we had to hold up a mirror to america to see itself and it makes them cynical about whether they should continue to participate in the political process, and so there is a sense of urgency, i would just say, around the dismantling of this phoney commission and i hope in this discussion well talk about can be done, actually, to do that. And ms. Gupta, just briefly if you can. Yeah. I would just add that the reality is that even if this commission is disbanded they are going to issue a report of some sort that is going to hyperinflate and mislead as they did last week that chris covac did with evidence out of New Hampshire claiming that 2016 election conducted in New Hampshire contained a lot of undetected voter fraud and i just think its really important to talk about how insulting last weeks testimony was on this poll tax kind of ahistorical distortion of history in the face of the fact that chris covac had a longstanding antiimmigrant, antilatino agenda in arizona, and that he walked in and has been known to amend the national Voter Registration act to lower the burden of proof for states to purge voters and theres serious litigation now in ohio which is now the subject of the Supreme Court case and in georgia on this very topic and the u. S. Census says that minorities are represented in 85 of the 100 most common last names. A lot of those folks are going to have latino last name and are going to be targeted as a result of his efforts and i think its something we should be keeping very careful eye on. Thank you very much. Were going back and forth in a vote so well get senator coons in here. Thank you, senator klobuchar and thank you for convening you and thank you for each of our five Witnesses Today for your willingness to come and share your experience with us. I am deeply frustrated by the judiciary committees failure to hold a hearing but i am grateful for this chance to talk with you about Voting Rights and about the situation of Voting Rights and Voter Suppression in the United States today. I think it is important to the future of our democracy at the same time that were trying to get to the bottom of what happened with interference from a foreign power. We also need to be clear about ongoing actions domestically to try and use alleged concerns about voter integrity to, in fact, suppress Voter Participation, Voter Registration, voter activity and we are in the late stages of a vote so ill try and be focused. During this administration weve already seen that the Civil Rights Division backed down from enforcing the Voting Rights act after six years of litigating the case. The Justice Department dropped its claim that texass voter i. D. Law was passed with intent to discriminate and less than two months later a federal judge found the law was passed with such intent. Why do you think the civil rights decision would have abandoned a meritorious claim of intentional race discrimination . Well, the attorney general Jeff Sessions has long been in opposition to the aggressive and prosecution of the Voting Rights act so it was no surprise to us, we were cocounsel with the attorney general on that case that there would be less enthusiasm about continuing to prosecute the case but i think the decision to abandon the intentional discrimination claim was actually a very particular one. The intentional discrimination claim carries with it the possibility of a very particular remedy under the Voting Rights act and that remedy is bailen which we heard talked about earlier, that is the ability, the possibility of returning preclearance to a jurisdiction that has been found to engage in intentional discrimination. The state of texas probably has the worst record of any state in the United States in terms of judicial decisions and Congressional Redistricting and in other areas and so it faces and faced and continues to face the very real possibility of a bailin and in my view the attorney general hoped to undermine that important remedy that would have allowed the residents of texas to be protected against the legislatures intentionally discrimination acts. You previously led the Civil Rights Division within the department of just, when in your view would it be appropriate for to change a position in similar case, is there any further reason to believe that what happened here was an attempt to avoid liability under what remains of the Voting Rights act in the bailin provision. I would have to say that i agree with eiffels analysis on that. The Justice Department to reverse that position after career prosecutors had 46 years prosecuted very aggressively a claim with private intentional and, in fact, had prevailed through numerous federal Court Decisions before the new Justice Department had withdrew that claim. It was an unprecedented action that i think very much was an effort to avoid to avoid bailin disagreed with this Justice Department and vindicated the career lawyers, it was also notable that none of the career lawyers who had actually toiled away for years on that case through trials and hearings signed the substantive papers that withdrew that claim. Let me just ask a closing question if i might because i know weve got other senators eager to ask. Ms. Gupta, the Fourth Circuit also held North Carolina post shelby voter i. D. Case targeted africanamericans with almost surgical precision and those changes were passed by the state legislature with racially discriminate intent. How can we help americans appreciate that what may seem like technical or minor changes to voting laws are, in fact, attempts to discriminate against fellow americans and bar them from those foundational right in a democracy which is the right to vote . I think its a good question. I think theres a tremendous amount of misunderstanding of how judges reach conclusions of intentional discrimination in both the North Carolina case and the texas voter i. D. Case but i would add the texas redistricting case as well. We now have a substantial number of judges at both the appellate level and District Court level have reached conclusions that these attempts to suppress the vote are motivated by intentional discrimination and no matter how much the Justice Department may seek to prevent those findings, they real, theyre findings by judges that have been appointed of president s of both parties and theyre significant because of the size of these states. Texas second most populus state in the country. I think we can understand why Jeff Sessions would want to prevent that state in particular from being subject to a bailin order subjecting it to preclearance yet again. I think we need to make sure the public understands how judges and how many judges have reached these careful conclusions after presentation through trial of substantial evidence on both sides. Well i want to thank the whole panel and ill thank senator stabenow again. Thank you for the opportunity to be with you. Thank you, senator coons, very much and apologize there is a vote going on so were all going back and forth trying to do our best to be two places at once. Senator warren . Thank you very much and thank you again for convening this hearing. Thank you all for being here. The right to vote is under attack in this country and since the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights act, Voter Suppression efforts have sharply accelerated. These new barriers are designed to shutout africanamericans, latinos, the elderly, students and any other targeted groups to get them out of the democratic process. That is alarming enough, but now instead of protecting voters from Voter Suppression, the president of the United States is using the power of his office to donald trump lost the popular vote by nearly 3 million vote. He is president only because of the rules of the Electoral College and hes pretty sensitive about that and he has struck back with the claim that he lost the popular vote only because millions of people voted illegally. Now, ms. Ten nant you served as the secretary of state of West Virginia, you currently lead state advocacy work for the Brennan Center which examines these issues, is there any evidence to backup the president s claim that millions of pep voted illegally . No. Okay. And i dont mean to flippant about that. No thats an answer. When those claims came about the Brennan Center was on it. Almost immediately and issued a report called noncitizen voting, the missing millions where they analyzed information from the local election administrators, they went down into those who were administering the elections and were able to debunk the claims. Okay. So youve looked at the data. Let me ask you a different question. According to our best available data on this, how prevalent is the fee nam no, maam of individuals engaging in voting fraud . It is rare and when you look at a consensus of reports and investigations not just from the Brennan Center but other organizations, other advocates as well, you see that that rate of illegal voting is extremely rare. Let me ask you what is more probable, someone engaging in voter fraud or someone getting struck by lightning . This is a fact that the Brennan Centers put out so you must follow us on twitter like the reverend does, being struck by lightning. I just want to be clear on this. So there are no facts to backup the president s claim, so the president decided to establish a commission to study voter fraud, a commission that seems entirely focused on promoting and justifying state level Voter Suppression. So i just want to ask a little bit about those state level efforts. Ms. Eiffel, since 2010, how many states have passed laws to make it harder for citizens to vote . 20. 20. And have any states advanced voting laws that are so aggressively illegal that they have been invalidated by federal courts. Many and just, you know, since 2014, ten of those decisions have been ones in which federal courts including some of the most conservative federal courts in this country have found that states or local jurisdictions intentionally enacted laws for the purpose of discriminating against africanamerican and latino voters. So they found actual intent. Intentional discrimination. Intentional discrimination. Ms. Kupta, the Civil Rights Division is supposed to Police Unconstitutional efforts to suppress the vote. Has the Trump Administrations Civil Rights Division demonstrated that it takes the problem of Voter Suppression seriously . It has taken unprecedented action to reverse longstanding positions that career lawyers were litigating to establish just how Voter Suppression laws were working in that they were racially discriminatory so in a number of cases including obviously the texas i. D. Case which ive discussed, but also in the houston indication had actually reversed positions that were aimed at approving a deep factual record to salvage Voter Suppression in the enactment of those laws. So it would be the opposite. So the department of justice has moved in exactly the opposite direction on Voter Suppression instead of protecting voters, their helping the states in terms of suppressing the vote . That appears to be the case and theres a lot of concern now about the june letter that they sent out on trying to get information from state National Voter purging efforts and so we are anticipating more along those lines as well. Okay. More and more americans are worried about widespread voter fraud and i dont blame them. The idea of widespread coordinated effort to steal elections is really scary and totally madeup. But when the president of the United States uses his bullhorn to advance this theory, then a lot of people start to Pay Attention to it. And ill be blunt, i dont expect the president to change. I dont expect Jeff Sessions who has made a career out of undermining civil rights protection to change but they are not the only Public Officials in this country. 11 years ago, the Senate Passed the Voting Rights act by a vote of 980 and it is time for Public Officials at every level of government to start leading again on this issue. If we care about bringing this country together, then all americans must have an equal vote in our democracy, and that means we could pass a new Voting Rights advancement act and other bills to protect the right to vote. We could conduct oversight over the department of justice specifically the Civil Rights Division and make sure theyre enforcing our voting laws. We should be doing everything we can to avoid giving legitimacy to the president s sham Election Integrity commission. So weve got work to do on our side too to make sure that america understands the problem in this country is Voter Suppression. Thank you. Thank you very much, senator warren and i was thinking that based on your exchange with ms. Tennant that maybe we need a commission on the impact of being struck by lightning. Id like to turn now to senator duck wirth who is the author of preregistration of voters everywhere. Did i get that right, act so thank you for your leadership. Thank you. Thank you to all of the witnesses for being here. Its good to see some of you again. Its a real pleasure to be here to discuss one of the founding tenets of our democracy the right to vote. The strength that this democracy truly depends on the participation of the american people. Like my colleagues, i think that its incredible disturbing at the very least and dangerous for the Trump Administration to continue to take measures to weaken Voting Rights and its really unfortunate that theyre focusing on actual serious threats to our democracy that are posed by fraudulent attacks on our election infrastructure. The president is actually trying to manufacturer false evidence of massive voter fraud to justify his attempts of Voter Suppression. While we must fight the horrible Shelby County decision, we cant solely remain on defense and i think that what we need to do is also focus on expanding an increasing opportunities to Voter Participation. So im proud that my home state of illinois just became the tenth state along with the district of columbia to approve automatic Voter Registration. Yeah. Its why i support legislation to expand reforms nationwide and its also why i introduced the preregistration voter act which is an act that will help voters become more civilly engaged. If we allow voters to become preregistered to vote at the age of 16, we have a real chance to improve Voter Participation, to strengthen Voting Rights for americans across the country. Ms. Tennant, welcome again. You discuss your home states modernization of the voting process, including illinois and West Virginia, allow people to preregister to vote prior to the age of 18. Could you please discuss how engaging young people prior to the age of 18 can influence voting engagement . Yes, it is very important as i talked about in my opening statement, when you have registered voters, you have that participation level ready to be enacted and its almost as if like come on in, youre part of the team now and i think its especially important for teenagers, for young voters to say do i belong here, am i allowed to be here and i think that with preregistration you have that and for a couple of reasons. They feel, yes, theyre a part of it and maybe even to use a term the reverend might use or the teenagers might use, if they experience fomo this will certainly help them fomo its the fear of missing out. We dont want people to miss out on elections. If you get registered at the age of 16, were going to where they are, right . Where are they . The dmv because they want to get that drivers license. If they get registered here theyll automatically be registered when they turn 18. Itll be more convenient and a whole lot easier for them and so thats thats why its important. What we even do in West Virginia, you can register at the age of 17 and vote in the primary election at age 17 if you are going to be 18 on or before the general election. So those are ways to encourage young people to get involved. Thank you. Ms. Eiffel, welcome, you addressed the unfortunate Historical Context and its impact on Voter Suppression within the black community specifically. According to the peer review center, nearly 35 of black eligible voters are young people. Do you think that engaging young people during their High School Years would effect overall voter turnout, not just in africanamerican communities but in black and brown communities as well . I absolutely think so and this is why i think its so important to find these opportunities to affirmty register people to vote or bring people in the tratat. It goes hand in hand with the protection of voters once they are registered. You dont want a bait and switch. What will make young people even more cynical is to register them to vote and then have them subjected to the kind of Voter Suppression tactics that were seeing around the country which are not just voter i. D. Laws. Moving polling places and redistricting in ways that essentially disenfranchise them so i think the two pieces have to be knit together. There has to be an aggressive effort to engage young people early in high school, give them opportunities to engage civically. Im of the belief that theyre the same way that people go to the post office for select service, all krung people should go to the post office and register to vote when they turn 18. Any means of automatically registering young people is critically important but i also think it goes hand in hand with insuring that once they are registered, guaranteeing them that their right to vote is protected, that theyre able to participate in the political process, that theyre vote is able to count and theyre not subject to the kind of tactics that weve seen through the country that try to ensure that registered voters dont have power. I think what you speak to is incredible powerful. We had an issue in chicago when our chinatown area, not an attempt at voter disenfranz whiezment, leftover legacy of hundreds of years in the city where chinatown was divided at the state level between multiple representations, so there was these two blocks of chinatown was in this district, these two blocks were over there and they never were able to elect a member from the community to represent them. Thats working to be fixed. We have some of the first Asian Americans elected in automatic races. Its wrong that it took until i was elected when we have had we have the only chinatown in the United States thats still growing. Its a Different Community than in the traditional black and brown communities but its certainly one thats a real issue and we need to make sure of that in addition to the early registration, people can go vote and see a difference in what the vote the Community Also protected by the Voting Rights act and preclearance and thats part of why we need hand in hand the registration and the access and then also the tools to voig orrusly protect. Exactly. Ms. Inez, am i saying that correctly . You laid out the challenges for latinos voting today. As you noded latinos are one of the fastest demographics of eligible voters and i know that this particular population is wellknown as being particularly young. Nearly half of u. S. Born latinos are younger than 18. Can you speak to the benefits of programming which involves them early on in the democratic process such as preregistration and also perhaps anything thats doing ties preregistration to increase Civic Engagement . I think it would have a tremendously positive effect because of the youth in the community because of the connection to schooling, when you reach them when theyre still in high school and are able to preregister them, when its coupled with good civics education, i think it could have a particular impact in the Latino Community because so many of our u. S. Citizen youth may be the children of immigrants who are not yet naturalized, not yet able to vote. Therefore may not see in their families an example of Voter Participation, so having that provided to them through high school, through the dmv, through the kinds of things that youth engage in collectively could be very positive and encouraging future participation in elections. Thank you and also is there any i dont know if theres data on this, i grew up even though i was born in america and born overseas and i didnt speak english until i was 8yearold, spent a lot of my youth translating for my mother, she became a citizen in her 50s and just the role the young people in communities where there is a large immigrant population, whether its the Asian American community or the Latino Community or even Africanamerican Community sometimes its a young person who actually if theyre registered to vote are the ones are going to encourage their parents who might not have gone to the polls otherwise. There are millions of eligible but not yet naturalized citizens in the Latino Community and youre exactly right. If the children become engaged as native born u. S. Citizens in the electoral process that may become an encouragement for their parents to take the step to naturalize so that they themselves can register to vote and participate. And even if they are already citizens, the parents sometimes, when youre that first generation immigrant, youre worried about working and you just dont have the time and its not something that you even participate in because its not been a traditional. Sometimes it takes the children to yes. Thats absolutely right and it is a continuum. You have to start with making registration easier and you have to move to making sure access to the ballot is secure and accessible for everyone and you have to ensure that you have electoral structures that permit a meaningful vote to be cast. The worst thing is for those youth or their parents to believe their vote doesnt count because they continually see their candidates lose as a result of at large election systems or gerrymandering of districts to prevent minorities from having a meaningful vote. Reverend, did you want to speak a little bit to this idea of allowing 16yearolds to preregister within a Community Like yours in detroit . You have a large naacp branch there. Absolutely. We have a large Latino Community there as well and large arab community, deer born has the largest muslim communication outside the middle east. Let me suggest this and ill answer your question, but i want to say this for the record and i have to say this, senator, because i wouldnt be who i am if i didnt say this. My folks expect me to say this. That is first of all, there was a study done by the university in which justin leavet found that 1 billions votes cast only 31 were cases of voter fraud, 31 out of a billion. Between 2000 and 2014. There would be much more weight given to a commission on integrity if the same commission was concerned about russian interference with the electoral process of the nation, yet the same president and the same composition of the commission has disavowing any connection to that at all, yet all the intelligence agencies of the nation have said that there was interference with our election. So that right there delegitimizes anything they would bring to the table so when you ask the question of whether or not young people at 16 should be no question about it. When young people graduate from high school, they should be given a dip loma and a temporary voter card, registration card. They cant vote then but they should be given a dip loma and a card that says im getting ready to vote with some tenets of why its important to vote on it. That should be across america. At every school. All of us should have that. In addition to the fact that we in detroit have what we call the abcs of voting. Voter registration, voter mobilization, Voter Participation. There has to be a holistic approach. The attorney general of the United States of america is almost gleeful when it comes to pulling back on Voter Registration and protection and enforcement. Its almost like hes having i wont say it, but its like hes overjoyful and gleeful at pulling back. Many of us in the Africanamerican Community view this time as another reconstruction to the degree that if you understand the history of america, i know you do, in the 1876 election of tilden and hayes there was a compromise made of 1877 in which one individual would get the election of presidency, if, in fact, certain things were done down south. Meaning to pull back the advancements that africanamericans had made. It was a die lugs of their power, it was a taken away of all the advancements that they had made and also indicated that the north would not enforce any of the laws, that would protect the rights of africanamericans. Weve just experienced eight years of barack obama. There is a backlash. Lets just be honest. Theres a backlash to everything that has been done relative to this. Our nation has become a more black and brown whether we like it or not, thats the way of the world. It doesnt make us anything other than the way thats that intimidates people. That intimidates the president and the attorney general relative to the emphasizes that they have. In line with that as you can see the power to pull back and it has to be holistic. Pull back Voter Registration, pull back the emphasis of voter enforcement, pull back the dojs emphasis relative to texas and North Carolina, pull back enforcing the conscent degrees in police department, pull back the militarization of Police Departments relative to how they engage, pull back. Thats the same thing that was done in 1877, pull back. So in 2017 were announcing a pull back and so you cannot separate what has occurred from what is occurring and it all has a definite effect to the degree that is designed to intimidate, to frustrate and to eliminate the vote. When you beat the people down so much and you make it so difficult for them to access the polls, who wants to go . Who wants to stand in line . Who wants to go to a poll and theyve been changed and nobody notified them . How many seniors want to drive and use money that they use for pharmaceutical products and food to have to pay for state issued i. D. S when theyre drivers license or Social Security card and theyve been voting in the same place for 20, 30, 40, 50 years. That is an affront to all of us as americans. Thats not a black thing, a brown thing, a white thing, a yellow thing, thats the right thing. The right thing is for us to engage in a process that brings everybody to the table beginning when our young people are in school. When they walk across that stage, two things, your diploma and your Voter Registration or temporary Voter Participation card. That means you are in now. Everybody and thats not a partisan issue, thats an american issue. And so i think that we can resolve this but it has to be holistic. If we improve the voting process and we still got these other issues, senator, we still got a problem. If we resolved those other issues, and we cant vote, you know we got a problem. Im simply saying its going to require all of us to be committed. I like what senator warren said when she said oversight, oversight, oversight because these folks are working out of sight to make sure that they can take back what they think they have lost. When i hear lets make America Great again, i dont know what period in American History they talking about and who they talking about to the degree that are you talking about antebellum period, reconstruction period, are you talking about 1930s and 40s, 50s when none of us were on tv. What part of make America Great you talking about . We really want to make America Great lets make it fair and just. I dont think i can top that. I yield back. Thank you very much. Thank you reverend anthony for giving us a wonderful close to a very important hearing. I want to just note for the record we had 16 members of our caucus that joined us today. Democratic senators, many of whom, have introduced legislation like senator duck worth and most of us who have signed on to cosponsor those efforts because this is foundational to our democracy and freedom, whether voting is suppressed by the efforts of a foreign country or by governments in our own country, either way, its got to stop. And so im hopeful that by taking this opportunity and having this discussion that our Senate Republican colleagues in the majority sharing the committees will be willing to join with us in formal hearings on legislation that will actually create more opportunities for people to vote, more integrity in the vote, more resources for training, for equipment, those things that will allow us to be able to fully say to everyone as an american citizen that you have the right to vote and that we mean it. So thank you very much. President trump spoke at the opening of the 77ened General Assembly in new york. He confronted the leaders of north korea and iran who he said are threatening International Peace and security. The president called on the Security Council to maintain its unity in pressuring north korea to end its Nuclear Program and on iran to halt its support of terror groups. You can watch his remarks in their entirety on cspan3. Earlier today the Senate Armed Services held a committee on recent military incidents at sea. Navy security richard spenter offered his deepest condolences to the families of the sailors lost at sea and the u. S. Navy as a problem and itll be fixed. Heres a look. Chairman mccain, Ranking Member reed, distinguished members of this committee, i want to thank you for the opportunity to appear before you and talk about the state of our navy. Before we move forward, though, i want to suppress our deepest condolences to the families and loved ones and the crews that have lost one of their own in the last few months. Having looked into the eyes of many of these families and shared time with them, knowing that their return one returned home in a flag draped casket i know my words are insufficient. To the families present, please know that polly and i have you in our thoughts and prayers. The 17 sailors from the uss fitzgerald and general mccain were sons, husbands, brothers, fiances u uncles and friends. They were patriots and they will not be forgotten. We pledge our full support to our families and crews. Well back our words with actions. We have a problem in the navy and were going to fix it. In addition to the investigations already initiated, we are conducting two thorough reviews, the cnos comprehensive review will take a look at the tactical and operational situation at hand, my strategic readiness review will be an independent team kpropsed of military and Industry Experts that will look and examine root causes, accountability, longterm systemic issues and then provide remedial insight. These reviews will compliment an enhance each other providing the depth and criticalality that the situation demands. After ive received a review of the recommendations from our teams, i will act to the limits of my authority to change processes and acquire any needed capabilities in order to protect our people. Im here today to impress our sense of urgency and highlight a way forward to renew a culture of safety and training across the fleet. We will take Lessons Learned from the recent tragic events and come out the other side a stronger more capable navy marine core team. Make no mistake. We are not waiting 60 days or 90 days to make adjustments. The cno addressed the list of actions the seventh fleet is taking immediately to address the situation at hand ranging from ship to ship Material Inspection to the activate of radar identifications while were trafficking specific areas. We are not lying idle and i can tell you, ladies and gentlemen, we are committed. I appreciate the opportunity to work with you on the Remedial Solutions and to find our way forward. Thank you and i look forward to your questions. That was just part of the hearing held earlier this evening on recent military incidents at sea. You can watch the entire event tonight at 9 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan. Washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Coming up wednesday morning, Health Care Reporter mary he willen mac entire talks about a new Senate Proposal to repeal and replace Affordable Care act. Were live in trenton, new jersey, where well speak with Jim Mcgreevey about his work with helping former inmates transition to life outside prison. Also a look at the top issues before the new Jersey Legislature with new Jersey State Senate president Steve Sweeney and montana steve danes will talk about fire management. Be sure to watch cspans washington journal live at 7 eastern wednesday morning. Join the discussion. Next a hearing on possible reforms to the u. S. Business tax code. The Senate Finance Committee Held a hearing with tax policy experts. They discussed changes they believe could spur economic growth. This is two hours