S. HRG. 112–893 PROHIBITING THE USE OF DECEPTIVE PRACTICES AND VOTER INTIMIDATION TACTICS IN FED- ERAL ELECTIONS: S. 1994 HEARING BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY UNITED STATES SENATE ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS SECOND SESSION JUNE 26, 2012 Serial No. J–112–84 Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary ( U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 88–840 PDF WASHINGTON : 2014 For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512–1800; DC area (202) 512–1800 Fax: (202) 512–2104 Mail: Stop IDCC, Washington, DC 20402–0001 COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont, Chairman HERB KOHL, Wisconsin CHUCK GRASSLEY, Iowa DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah CHUCK SCHUMER, New York JON KYL, Arizona DICK DURBIN, Illinois JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island LINDSEY GRAHAM, South Carolina AMY KLOBUCHAR, Minnesota JOHN CORNYN, Texas AL FRANKEN, Minnesota MICHAEL S. LEE, Utah CHRISTOPHER A. COONS, Delaware TOM COBURN, Oklahoma RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, Connecticut BRUCE A. COHEN, Chief Counsel and Staff Director KOLAN DAVIS, Republican Chief Counsel and Staff Director (II) C O N T E N T S STATEMENTS OF COMMITTEE MEMBERS Page Leahy, Hon. Patrick J., a U.S. Senator from the State of Vermont .................... 1 prepared statement .......................................................................................... 28 Grassley, Hon. Chuck, a U.S. Senator from the State of Iowa ............................ 3 Schumer, Hon. Charles E., a U.S. Senator from the State of New York, prepared statement .............................................................................................. 30 Sessions, Hon. Jeff, a U.S. Senator from the State of Alabama, prepared statement .............................................................................................................. 32 WITNESSES Witness List ............................................................................................................. 27 Cardin, Hon. Benjamin L., a U.S. Senator from the State of Maryland ............. 5 prepared statement .......................................................................................... 42 House, Tanya Clay, Director of Public Policy, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, Washington, DC .................................................................. 8 prepared statement .......................................................................................... 50 Park, John J., Jr., of Counsel, Strickland Brockington Lewis LLP, Atlanta, Georgia .................................................................................................................. 10 prepared statement .......................................................................................... 66 Flanagan, Jenny, Director of Voting and Elections, Common Cause, Wash- ington, DC ............................................................................................................. 12 prepared statement .......................................................................................... 69 QUESTIONS Questions submitted by Senator Leahy for Jenny Flanagan ............................... 75 Questions submitted by Senator Grassley for Tanya Clay House ....................... 76 Questions submitted by Senator Grassley for John J. Park, Jr. ......................... 82 Questions submitted by Senator Grassley for Jenny Flanagan ........................... 85 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS Responses of Tanya Clay House to questions submitted by Senator Grassley .. 95 Responses of John J. Park, Jr. to questions submitted by Senator Grassley ..... 111 Responses of Jenny Flanagan to questions submitted by Senators Leahy and Grassley ......................................................................................................... 119 MISCELLANEOUS SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD Brennan Center for Justice, New York University School of Law, New York, New York, statement ........................................................................................... 138 De¯mos Ideas & Action, Brenda Wright, Vice President, Legal Strategies, Washington, DC, June 25, 2012, letter .............................................................. 140 Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), Lillie Coney, Associate Direc- tor, Washington, DC, statement ......................................................................... 142 Executive Summary from Deceptive Practices, June 2012 Report ...................... 146 Henderson, Wade, President & CEO, Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, statement ................................................................................... 148 National Bar Association, Daryl D. Parks, President, Tallahassee, Florida, statement .............................................................................................................. 151 National Congress of American Indians (NCAI), Washington, DC, statement .. 156 National Urban League, Marc H. Morial, President and CEO, New York, New York, statement ........................................................................................... 158 (III) IV Page New York Times, ‘‘In 5-Year Effort, Scant Evidence of Voter Fraud’’, April 12, 2007, article .................................................................................................... 162 Project Vote, Washington, DC, statement and attachments ................................ 168 Shelton, Hilary O., Director, NAACP, Washington, DC, statement .................... 172 U.S. Department of Justice, Judith C. Appelbaum, Acting Assistant Attorney General, July 2, 2012, letter ............................................................................... 175 ADDITIONAL SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD Submissions for the record not printed due to voluminous nature, previously printed by an agency of the Federal Government or other criteria deter- mined by the Committee: Deceptive Practices 2.0: Legal and Policy Responses—issued by Common Cause, The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, and The Century Foundation: http://www.commoncause.org/research-reports/ National_102008_Report_Deceptive_Practices_2-0.pdf Deceptive Election Practices and Voter Intimidation—The Need for Voter Protection—issued by Common Cause and The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, July 2012: http://www.commoncause.org/research-reports/ National_070612_Deceptive_Practices_and_Voter_Intimidation.pdf PROHIBITING THE USE OF DECEPTIVE PRAC- TICES AND VOTER INTIMIDATION TACTICS IN FEDERAL ELECTIONS: S. 1994 TUESDAY, JUNE 26, 2012 U.S. SENATE, COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, Washington, DC. The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:06 a.m., in Room SD–226, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Patrick J. Leahy, Chairman of the Committee, presiding. Present: Senators Leahy, Schumer, Whitehouse, Coons, Grassley, and Lee. OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. PATRICK J. LEAHY, A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF VERMONT Chairman LEAHY. Thank you all for being here. We are holding a hearing to consider the Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimida- tion Prevention Act of 2011. It is intended to protect one of the most fundamental rights Americans enjoy: the right to vote. In De- cember, I joined Senators Schumer, Cardin, Whitehouse, and oth- ers to introduce the bill. Actually, in 2007, I joined on similar legis- lation by then-Senator Barack Obama. The legislation has the support of the Justice Department. The Attorney General has identified it as one of three areas ‘‘crucial in driving progress’’ to protect all Americans and their right to vote. I think we have to be doing all we can to protect people’s access to the ballot box. The right to vote and to have your vote count is a foundational right, like our First Amendment rights, because it secures the ef- fectiveness of other protections. Also, you have to be assured that everybody has the right to vote to give legitimacy of our Govern- ment. Attempts to deny Americans access to voting undermine our democracy. I am fortunate to be from a State like Vermont where most places you vote are very small areas, and everybody knows every- body. We never had any indication of a suppression of voters. But that does not happen everywhere. Protecting access for people is ever more important in the after- math of the Citizens United decision by the Supreme Court, but we now know that as a result of the fact that corporations rather than individuals are wielding more and more influence over our electoral processes. In fact, just yesterday, without even a hearing, the Su- preme Court doubled down on Citizens United by summarily strik- (1) 2 ing down a 100-year-old Montana State law barring corporate con- tributions to political campaigns, even though the record was very complete that the reason the law had been passed was because of the corrupting influence and the—actually, the corruption that oc- curred in Montana because of those same corporate contributions. I think that those on the Court who opened the floodgates to un- limited and unaccountable corporate spending on federal political campaigns have now taken another step to break down public safe- guards against corporate money drowning out the voices of hard- working Americans. I am not one who thinks of corporations as being persons in that regard. If they were, we could say just be- cause we elected General Eisenhower as President, why can’t we elect General Electric as President? Unfortunately, the way this