Proposal would block students from voting where they attend university
PHOENIX -- A veteran lawmaker is making another bid at blocking students from voting where they go to school.
The proposal by Rep. Bob Thorpe, R-Flagstaff, would create an exception to existing law which says that someone is a resident for voting purposes based on actual physical presence “with an intent to remain.’’
His HB 2461 would spell out that anyone who is living in a dormitory “or other temporary college or university address’’ is presumed to be there only temporarily and is there “with intent to return to some other permanent address.’’
A separate provision actually could have even more far-reaching implications.
It would ban the use of any address “at which the individual does not intend to reside for 12 months of each year.’’ And that, in turn, could create problems for people who consider Arizona their home but may spend several months a year elsewhere.
Thorpe told Capitol Media Services it’s not his intent to throw hurdles in the path of students who want to be politically involved.
“I want them to vote,’’ he said. But he said it’s something different when a youngster from Tucson decided to attend Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff.
“So what that kid needs to do is take out his No. 2 pencil and check a little box when he registers to vote that says he wants to get a mail-in early ballot,’’ he said, one from the community Thorpe believes is his true domicile.
But this is more than an academic exercise.
“I’ve had numerous constituents who have come to me and are as just as angry as all getout, including business people up here in Flag, when they have a student who’s only living here six months out of the year who then changes the dynamics of an election,’’ Thorpe said.
There is some evidence that has happened.
Most notable was the 2016 vote by Flagstaff residents to eventually move the city’s minimum wage to $15 an hour, a measure Thorpe opposed. It was approved by a margin of 54-46 percent.
But in precincts around the Northern Arizona University campus, it passed with a 2-1 edge -- even close to 3-1 at two precincts which include parts of the campus. And that was enough to blunt the vote of some residential precincts where the measure failed.
“They’re really hurting now,’’ Thorpe said. “I’ve had restaurant owners and hotel owners, you name it, that are just reeling under the minimum wage.’’
Thorpe also acknowledged he has not done particularly well in his election bids..
Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, who is the state’s chief election official, said what Thorpe is proposing works against what she has been trying to do.
“We have a pretty clear record here in my office of working to try to engage students, make it easier for them to be able to register to vote in the place that they choose to do so,’’ she told Capitol Media Services. And Hobbs, a Democrat, said having students be able to vote where they go to school -- and where they spend most of the year -- “helps them be more engaged in their communities here.’’
“I don’t know why we wouldn’t be encouraging that,’’ she said.