Missouri General Assembly passes bill deemed ‘breathtaking’ in its voter, election restrictions
League members across Missouri, along with partners in the Missouri Voter Protection Coalition, condemned passage on May 12 of HB 1878, an omnibus bill now on Gov. Mike Parson’s desk. The bill includes changes to voter registration rules, election administration and who has litigation authority over matters relating to voters and elections.
Throughout the session, Missouri League President Marilyn McLeod and board member Nancy Copenhaver testified against HB 1878. Members lobbied May 3 at a voting rights rally in the Capitol rotunda with the Missouri Voter Protection Coalition.
Denise Lieberman, director and general counsel of the MVPC, said, “H.B. 1878 is breathtaking in the ways it undermines our elections – requiring an unconstitutional photo ID provision, implementing a phantom early voting provision, hindering voter registration drives, allowing the Secretary of State to order voters removed from the rolls, and it opens the door to sham audits and more.”
What began as a seven-page Photo ID bill became an 80-plus page “Model Voter Sabotage Bill” incorporating some the most restrictive provisions seen in states around the country, said Lieberman.
HB 1878 will be effective Aug. 28 if Gov. Parson signs it by the first week of July. A provision taking authority over election and voter litigation from the attorney general’s office and giving it to the legislature could prompt the Governor’s veto.
The MVPC is asking League member
s and partners in its 60 organizations to sign a petition asking the governor to veto the bill. Find the petition here.
Read the final text of HB 1878, as passed by the House and Senate. It is 58 pages long.
–Thanks to Evelyn Maddox, Missouri League voter protection chair and past president, for this information, parts of which appeared in the May-June edition of the Missouri Voter.