How a massive ramp up in penalties for officials who violate election laws could cause them to err heavily on the side of vote suppression. jonathanchait writes
Photo: Hannah Yoon/Bloomberg via Getty Images The Republican Party program of vote suppression has several elements. The most widely covered are the proposals to roll back voting access by restricting the use of drop boxes and mail voting, or imposing more paperwork requirements on prospective voters.
• Iowa, in addition to limiting voter access by cutting early voting days and forbidding local election officials from mailing out absentee-ballot request forms without a specific request from a voter, will now make it a crime if election workers violate the new rules. • Arizona legislators want to make it a felony for an election worker to mail an early ballot to a voter who has not requested one.