An estimated 700,000 young minority voters could be barred from voting in November because of photo ID laws passed across the country in recent years, according to a new study.
The number of minority voters under the age of 30 likely to be disenfranchised by these new voting laws — passed overwhelmingly by Republican-led legislatures across the country — is a conservative estimate, according to the study’s authors. The actual number of voters in that category who could be disenfranchised is probably closer to 1 million, they said.
The projections include African Americans, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans and Pacific Islanders.
“It’s a reminder that our voting rights have always been under attack and probably always will be,” said Cathy Cohen, a professor of political science at the University of Chicago who co-authored the report, Turning Back the Clock on Voting Rights: The Impact of New Photo Identification Requirements on Young People of Color.
The study was created by the Black Youth Project, a nonpartisan, not-for-profit organization that aims to increase civic engagement and voter participation among minority youth.
“I don’t think this is new, but I think the scale of it is new… I think the brashness of hearing elected officials talk about how these laws will guarantee a win in their state for [Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney],” Cohen told The Huffington Post. “And I think there is a willingness to be visible and vocal, which I think is new for us in the modern era.”
The study estimates that the new laws, passed in 17 states, could cut turnout among young people of color in those states by between 538,000 and 696,000 voters, levels below turnout figures for those groups in the last two presidential elections.
