For Immediate Release:

Contacts:

Timothy Rusch: (917) 399-0236, tim@fitzgibbonmedia.com

Rachel Tardiff: (202) 746-1507, rachel@fitzgibbonmedia.com

NEW YORK – Today, a Pennsylvania judge blocked part of the state’s discriminatory selective voter ID law, ruling that the current implementation of law could lead to voter disenfranchisement and ordering that it not be enforced in this presidential election. Last week, new reports from civil rights group ColorOfChange and SEIU showed that the law creates more than a “minimal” burden for voters, and that certain demographics of voters—including those with low-incomes, people of color, the infirm, people with disabilities, and the elderly—face excessive hardship when obtaining the ID that would have been required by the new law.

The following is a statement from ColorOfChange Executive Director Rashad Robinson:

“Pennsylvania Judge Robert Simpson made the right choice today in ruling against this unfair law. Selective voter ID requirements only serve to block some of the country’s most marginalized communities from exercising their constitutional right to vote, tipping the scales in favor of right wing, exclusionary, partisan interests. However, we are concerned that he only views the current implementation of the law to be the cause of disenfranchisement. These types of voter ID laws are simply and always wrong.”

“In interviews with actual Pennsylvania citizens attempting to obtain ID, and reviews of PennDOT locations across the state, we found that Pennsylvania officials significantly understate the difficulties that Pennsylvania voters face in getting the ID required, and that PennDOT staff are woefully under prepared to handle the rule change so close to an election.”

“ColorOfChange members from across the country applaud Judge Simpson for allowing voters without ID have their ballots count this election year. ColorOfChange members are prepared to keep standing up against all voter ID laws. We thank the brave plaintiffs for bringing this lawsuit against the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the Advancement Project and the ACLU for all their work.”

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With more than 800,000 members, ColorOfChange.org is the nation’s largest Black online civil rights organization.