What Is the Truth about Voter ID?

The topic of discussion for this Constitution Monday concerns voter identification laws. Most Americans understand that Republicans/conservatives generally support strict ID laws, while Democrats/liberals generally peddle lies about ID laws. The biggest lies peddled by opponents to ID laws claim that they discriminate against African Americans because the laws suppress their vote. At the same time, they rally against the idea that strict ID laws protect the integrity as well as the security of elections.

In an article posted at The Daily Signal, Hans von Spakovsky and Joseph Sturdy wrote that we should “Trust the science” and understand that “Voter ID laws aren’t discriminatory and don’t suppress anyone’s vote.” 

For years, liberals have peddled fabricated claims about voter ID requirements, asserting that they give an advantage to the Republican Party by “discriminating against African Americans’ and suppressing their vote. They pooh-pooh the notion that such laws protect the integrity and security of elections.

Not only do black Americans not believe that voter laws discourage or prevent them from voting, but in 2019 a study by the National Bureau of Economic Research – based on turnout data from 2008 to 2018 – concluded that voter ID laws “have no negative effect on registration or turnout, overall or for any group defined by race, gender, age, or party affiliation.”

The authors quoted another study that was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The referenced study “once again has categorically refuted the myth propagated by the Left that voter ID laws, as the study says, place a ‘disproportionate burden’ on ‘historically disadvantaged groups such as the poor and people of color” and therefore hurt candidates of the Democratic Party.” The researchers of this study reported that they “studied the ‘electoral fortunes’ of both political parties in ‘races at the state level (state legislatures and governorships) and federal level (United States Congress and president) during 2003 to 2020.”

The study concluded that the first voter ID laws actually “produced a Democratic advantage, which weakened to near zero after 2012” so that today, voter ID laws have “negligible average effects.” That is academic-speak for saying voter ID laws have no effect on the ability of the candidates of either the Republican or Democratic parties to get elected.

In other words, voter security benefits both parties and all Americans.

The authors state that the new study supports the previous study. “The researchers’ conclusions emphatically demonstrate that Republican support for an issue doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s bad for Democrats.”

In fact, in contrast to the myth of voter suppression, the study found that both parties saw an increase in voter turnout after implementation of voter ID laws….

This study rejects the narrative spewed for years about the one-party benefit of election security measures. The facts reject the notion that Americans are too dumb to understand electoral security. The facts support voter ID, and the people do too.

So, trust the science: Secure your elections.