Activists say new Tennessee law aims to suppress African American votes
Tequila Johnson lists off laundromats, nightclubs and churches. Those are the places her team of 150 volunteers visited during the midterm elections last year, registering black voters across Tennessee. In the end, she estimates The Equity Alliance, where she is a co-founder, registered nearly 100,000 people up and down the state – more than 70,000 above their initial target.
“Laundromats [were] where the bulk of the registrations came from,” said Johnson, who is also the statewide manager for the Tennessee Black Voter Project (TBVP). “Because people are just sitting.”
It’s hard to say no when there is nothing else to do, one of her colleagues adds.
It’s also increasingly important in the face of what many voting rights activists see as a push by the state to suppress minority voters, who already face obstacles to exercising the franchise.
Last month Tennessee’s governor, Bill Lee, signed a law imposing restrictions on those groups holding voter registration drives, citing the high number of registrations collected by voting rights groups which are incorrect and become ineligible once filed to the state.
The law, once enforced, would fine those turning in incomplete or incorrect registration forms. In some cases, it could mean criminal charges. For example, a group that returns more than a hundred “deficient” forms could face a fine of up to $2,000 in each county “incorrect forms” were filled out. If more than 500 forms are found to be filled out incorrectly, that fine could be up to $10,000. It’s unclear what “deficient” and “incorrect” mean, both Johnson and Kristen Clarke, executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the organization which filed a lawsuit on behalf of six organizations in Tennessee, told the Guardian.
That legal complaint, naming the state’s secretary of state, Tre Hargett, and Mark Goins, Tennessee’s coordinator of elections, among others, claims: “The law puts unconstitutional obstacles” on groups registering people to vote by putting “harsh civil and criminal penalties based on vague and overbroad terms and standards”.
The law’s critics point to the success organizations like the Tennessee Black Voter Project and its partners had during the midterm elections last year, as possibly instilling fear in the Republican state government.
Johnson sees the move as a direct attempt to hamper her group’s ability to operate. “Definitely it was about registering all these black and brown people,” Johnson says.
In a statement Hargett’s office said they were committed to voting rights but would not comment on pending litigation. “We want every eligible Tennessean to vote, and voter registration must be done responsibly and in a manner that does not compromise the security or integrity of elections,” the statement said.
Tennessee is not alone in introducing voting laws opponents say might keep voters from showing up on election day. Though, according to a recent report in the Election Law Journal, it ranks as the third worst, behind only Mississippi and Virginia.
Since 2010, according to the nonpartisan public policy institute Brennan Center for Justice, 25 states have enacted voting laws ranging from voter registration limitations to stricter ID laws. In 2018, Georgia, for example, purged 1 million voters from the rolls before the midterm elections and held voters in limbo under an “exact match” rule – allowing an errant hyphen in a last name on a driver’s license, for example, but not on the voter registration form, to keep someone from voting.
The Tennessee law, Johnson said, could stem from efforts to register a large number of black voters in 2018, namely in Shelby county, where more than 50% of residents are African American. With nearly a million residents in the county, and more than 52% of them African American, the TBVP made a concerted effort to register voters there.
The Tennessee Black Voter Project signed up more than 35,000 voters in Shelby county last year, Johnson says. However, Linda Phillips, the Shelby county administrator of elections, told the Guardian that administrators were able to register only 4,040 people from the TBVP efforts, showing that flawed registrations are a common problem – and one that would be costly for voter registration groups under the new law – but also one that had little impact on the election result.
“There were just a wide variety of [flawed registrations],” she added. “Not too surprisingly there were only 11 people who tried to vote on election day from that group.”
In one case, she alleges 17 forms were from the same person. When addressing this allegation, the TBVP said that’s because Shelby county was
so slow in logging them. If the election commission had been doing its job there would be no need for a voter to turn in a second form.
Another 2,219 forms were not considered because, Phillips says, the TBVP submitted voter registration applications from felons.
“When you’re out at a community event, a street festival, a block party, you name it, there is a presumption the people you’re working with, people are filling out the form to the best of their ability. Maybe they’re too embarrassed to check the felon box,” said Brandon Puttbrese, a colleague of Johnson’s at the Tennessee Black Voter Project.
Johnson acknowledged there were errors in some of the filings but also pointed out it is illegal under state law to throw away a registration form, no matter if incomplete or if there is an error.
Proponents of these voter laws across the United States say they are in place to make voting and registration processing accessible. However, critics such as Shani Glapion, president of the Urban League of Young Professionals, says these types of laws deter already hesitant prospective voters. As a black woman, she’s worried those in her own community who don’t engage readily in the political process already will now completely avoid the polls.
The new law doesn’t bolster confidence in the state government or the system, Glapion thinks.
“This legislation is not moving that direction [to attract registration],” she explained. “You feel like your voice doesn’t matter.”
Tennessee already has one of the lowest voter registrations levels in the United States.
In the meantime, the TBVP is going to continue its work in the community. It’s more than about voting, Johnson explains. “Look, I’m going to help you. I think that’s where the heartbeat or the soul of our word really is,” she said, adding, “It’s just really, really about empowering people in the African American communities.”
The law puts harsh civil and criminal penalties based on vague and overbroad terms and standards
Legal complaint