Voter IDs are needed

By: The Editorial Board | GoDanRiver
Published: February 19, 2012

To the editor:

In response to, "What is Del. Marshall thinking," (Feb. 13, page A6), I would like to present the following from Politico, which reports that nationwide, there are 24 million invalid voter registrations.

There are 2 million registered voters who are dead. There are 2.75 million voters registered in two states. And there are 12 million voter registrations with incorrect addresses.

These statistics above are enough to warrant photo identifications just to clean up our voter records. But, as someone who made "get out the vote" phone calls, I found the following:

» One registered voter had the name, address and phone number of a woman’s 8-year-old son.

» Many calls resulted in no one by that name living at the given address.

» In addition, it is believed that many out-of-state college students have voted in Virginia elections and cast absentee ballots in their home states.

So, yes, there are indications of voter fraud in Virginia as well as incorrect voter registrations that need to be cleaned up.

But, to address the writer’s concerns, there is now and always will be "provisional" ballots if the voter does not have a picture ID. So, no one is disenfranchised. But, it is hard for me to believe, as she stated, that 25 percent of all African Americans in Virginia of voting age — some 260,000 people — do not have a driver’s license. How do they cash checks, use credit cards or take care of their day-to-day business? Amazing!

As you know, people can go to DMV and get a picture ID.

So, Del. Marshall, continue doing the fine job of solving Virginia’s problems. That is why we sent you to Richmond.

TOM WARREN

Danville