Dem witnesses dodge when asked whether only citizens should be allowed to vote in federal elections

Several witnesses who spoke at a recent congressional hearing refused to say whether voting in federal elections ought to be limited to U.S. citizens only.

On Tuesday, a panel of five witnesses — three brought by Democrats and two by Republicans — appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee to discuss the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. If passed, the bill would require federal approval before some changes to local and state election laws could be implemented. Proponents of the bill claim such onerous federal oversight of election practices is necessary to prevent discriminatory voter suppression efforts.

During his designated time, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) asked the panelists to give a "yes or no" response to two questions about federal elections vis-a-vis U.S. citizenship. The first question he posed was: "Do you believe that only citizens of the United States should be able to vote in federal elections?"

Despite Lee's directive that the panelists reply either yes or no, the three Democrat witnesses, representing various left-wing activist groups, refused to give a straight answer.

"We don’t have a position about non-citizens voting in federal elections," said Damon Hewitt, executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, a "racial justice" legal organization. "We believe that’s what the current laws are, and so we’re certainly fighting for everyone who is eligible under current law to vote."

Lydia Camarillo — president of Southwest Voter Registration Education Project, which seeks to "empower Latinos and Latinas through their vote" — first attempted to sidestep the issue by claiming that "state law" makes those decisions. When Lee pressed her to clarify whether the federal government had any right to determine who votes in federal elections, she replied, "I don’t have a position on that."

Sophia Lin Lakin, director of the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project, similarly weaseled out of answering the question directly: "Federal law prohibits non-citizens from voting in federal elections, and our focus is on enabling all eligible voters to be able to vote and cast their ballot."

Lee then followed up that question by asking whether people ought to prove that they are U.S. citizens when registering to vote. Again, he received a string of obfuscations.

"I think your first question kind of answers the second," said Hewitt. "Based upon the applicable rules, federal or state elections, what have you, we know we have to follow those rules. The question is what is the impact of those rules?"

Camarillo then tried to deflect by briefly rambling about voter registration affidavits, but when Lee redirected her back to the question at hand, she said with obvious disdain, "It's already redundant in many states, and it's already been asked."

For her part, Lakin asserted that laws requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote are "discriminatory."

The two Republican witnesses — Maureen Riordan of the Public Interest Legal Foundation and Hans von Spakovsky of the Election Law Reform Initiative at the Heritage Foundation — both affirmed that only U.S. citizens should be allowed to vote and that they should be required to provide documentary evidence of their citizenship when registering to vote.

Von Spakovsky later added that voter ID laws increase voter participation in all racial groups, including blacks and Hispanics. "That's not my opinion," he said. "That's based on turnout data that we now have for more than 15 years."

At the conclusion of his time, Lee lamented that the Democrat witnesses could not agree with the "overwhelming majority of Americans" who want only documented U.S. citizens voting in federal elections. "You have to show identification to board an airplane ... to go to the doctor ... to pick up prescriptions," he said. "Why not voting?"

The entire hearing can be seen here. Lee's time begins just before the 1:19:00 mark.

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