By Kathryn Nizzi
Editor’s Note: This article reflects the opinion of the writer.
Native American tribes in North Dakota are suing the state because of recent address change in the state’s voting policy.
North Dakota recently enacted a new voter identification that requires voters to have a street address to vote. Native Americans living on reservation do not have street address but use P.O. Box to receive their mail. This simple change in law suppresses an entire nation from voting.
Native American reservations do not function on an address system. Their mail is sent to their P.O. Box. The reservations do not use street names to label streets within their community. Without street signs, members of the community cannot even begin to gauge their address.
Republican leaders who created and passed the law said it was to prevent voter fraud. There is no reported instance of voter fraud in the state of North Dakota. U.S. District Court Judge Daniel Hovland ruled Native American tribe members must comply with the state’s new voter ID law.
Last week the Spirit Lake Tribe sued North Dakota’s Secretary of State Alvin Jaeger to block this law. The lawsuit cited multiple Native Americans who went through the process of getting the identification but are still unable to vote.
Voter suppression is nothing new to the United States, but it is taking new forms. Women were not allowed to vote until 1920, and not until 1924 was the Indian Citizenship Act passed that allowed Native Americans to vote.
North Dakota is not the only state in the spotlight for voter suppression. Civil rights groups sued Brain Kemp, Georgia gubernatorial candidate, for placing more than 50,000 voting registration applications on hold due to the “exact-match” law. The “exact-match” law requires the personal information on the voter application must match the state database.
Kemp is currently the Secretary of State, meaning he oversees and manages all the voting within the state. The court blocked the attempt to suppress voter’s ballots. More than 3,000 on the of the ballots are naturalized U.S. citizens. Out of all the ballots Kemp’s office has on hold, 70 percent are black voters.
Voter suppression is often a political battle and only affects those in the minority. Conversation around law, rights and abilities must continue after this election.
