Voting made easy
Deal with state agencies & you’ll be registered
ALBANY — New York is streamlining voter registration by enacting an automatic process that will add eligible residents to the rolls when they interact with state or local government agencies.
The law, signed Tuesday by Gov. Cuomo, makes it so New Yorkers will automatically be registered or have their voter information updated when they have contact with the government, such as renewing a driver’s license through the Department of Motor Vehicles.
“At a time in our country when voting rights are under assault, New York is living up to our potential as a progressive leader,” said sponsor Sen. Michael Gianaris (D-Queens). “Access to the ballot box should be easy and fair, and enacting Automatic Voter Registration will go a long way towards improving voter participation.”
The change will be phased in by state agencies over the course of several years starting with the DMV in 2023. The Health and Labor departments and the Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance will join in 2024, while the State University of New York will come online a year later.
Officials noted that 18 other states and the District of Columbia have similar laws on the books. In Oregon, 94% of eligible voters were registered through interactions with state agencies, which in turn led to the state having the largest turnout increase in the country between 2012 and 2016.
According to NYU Law Schools’s Brennan Center for Justice, automatic voter registration in New York State will bring an estimated 1 million new eligible voters onto the rolls.
“The policy has dramatically increased registration in states across the country,” said Sean Morales-Doyle, the deputy director of the Voting Rights and Elections Program at the Brennan Center. “And because this bill would put [automatic voter registration] in place in a number of New York agencies, it is sure to reach a broad cross section of New Yorkers.”
It took several years and more than one overhaul for the legislation to finally get to the governor’s desk. Last year, the measure was shelved at the eleventh hour after a technical issue would have directed noncitizens to register to vote. Lawmakers noticed the mistake only after the legislation was approved in both the Senate and Assembly.
Democrats in the Senate again approved the bill in January this year, but Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie (D-Bronx) said at the time changes still needed to be made.
The legislation finally gained approval in both chambers during a special summer session in July and builds on election measures allowing for early voting, preregistration of minors, electronic pollbooks, voting by mail and other reforms Dems passed since taking control of the Senate from Republicans.
“The right to vote is fundamental in a democracy such as ours and has been under attack for over 150 years,” said sponsor Assemblywoman Latrice Walker (D-Brooklyn). “Voting should be easy, efficient, and accessible.”