Native Americans in North Dakota are fighting back ahead of next week’s elections with a lawsuit challenging Republican voter suppression efforts in the state.
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According to The Hill, “The Spirit Lake Sioux tribe in North Dakota has filed a lawsuit aiming to prevent the state from enforcing its voter ID requirement in next week’s midterms, arguing that it will disenfranchise voters living on reservations, according to media reports.”
The new law requires Native Americans in the state to present a current residential address before they vote. The only problem, of course, is that tens of thousands of Native Americans don’t have traditional addresses because they live on reservations. As a result, they could lose their right to vote.
As Danielle Lang, a senior attorney with the Campaign Legal Center, told The Associated Press, “We have a choice between a democracy that includes all eligible voters and a system that excludes people based on their circumstances or backgrounds.”
“Unless the court steps in, eligible Native American voters including our clients may be denied the right to vote next week due to the state’s deeply flawed system of assigning and verifying voters’ residential addresses,” she added.
Republicans know exactly what they’re doing
As Rachel Maddow pointed out earlier this month, Republicans in North Dakota know Democrats cannot win in the state if the large population of Native Americans isn’t allowed to vote.
“What North Dakota Republicans did is fire a heat-seeking missile to nuke the Native American vote in their state,†Maddow said. “If the Republicans can turn off the Native American vote, if they can end that, they can run the table.â€
This is particularly important this year as incumbent Democratic Sen. Heidi Heitkamp is running in a still-competitive race against GOP challenger Kevin Kramer. According to a Fox News poll released Wednesday, that contest is now within single digits.
Heitkamp pulled an upset victory in 2012 when polling showed similar GOP leads at this point in the race. The GOP effort to keep tens of thousands of people from voting could prevent that from happening again.
If it’s up to the Native American population in North Dakota, Republicans won’t get away with it.
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Sean Colarossi currently resides in Cleveland, Ohio. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and was an organizing fellow for both of President Obama’s presidential campaigns. He also worked with Planned Parenthood as an Affordable Care Act Outreach Organizer in 2014, helping northeast Ohio residents obtain health insurance coverage.
