Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, and Coretta Scott King Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act of 2006

FANNIE LOU HAMER, ROSA PARKS, AND CORETTA SCOTT KING VOTING RIGHTS ACT REAUTHORIZATION AND AMENDMENTS ACT OF 2006

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Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Chairman, I rise in very strong support of the renewal of the Voting Rights Act.

Unfortunately, this great American struggle is not over. We have seen voters denied their rights in recent elections as they have been incorrectly purged from lists, their absentee votes not counted, and voting machine integrity and security not assured.

Ohioans have raised countless questions about today's new electronic voting systems, their flawed security, their lack of transparency, their reliability and, yes, their very integrity. Who controls the security codes in these machines? How do we ensure that local boards of election and judges at the precinct level are empowered to properly count votes and not the voting machine companies who know more about those machines and how to program them than the people conducting the elections themselves?

Strong efforts have been made in Ohio to curb the authoritarianism of our Secretary of State, Kenneth Blackwell, as he has purged people from lists in our State in particular precincts where voters are heavily minority.

Mr. Chairman, we must pass the Voting Rights Act in its stronger form. The struggle is not over. As Reverend Joseph Lowery reminds us, keep hope alive, extend the Voting Rights Act.

I am in strong support of the passage of the Voting Rights Act to protect the ability of all citizens, particularly minorities, to vote. Unfortunately, this struggle is not over. We have seen voters denied their rights in several recent elections as voters have been incorrectly purged from lists, their absentee votes not counted, and voting machine integrity not assured.

Ohioans have raised countless questions about today's new electronic voting systems, their flawed security, their lack of transparency, their reliability, and yes, their very integrity. Who controls the security code for the machines? How do we assure that local Boards of Elections and judges at the precinct level are empowered to properly count votes and not the voting machine companies who know more about those machines and how to program them than the people conducting the elections.

Strong efforts were made by Ohio's Legislature to mandate voter verifiable paper trails on election machines, over the objections of Ohio's Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell. Chairing the Bush campaign in Ohio, he opposed this standard. Blackwell also steered and limited the voting machine vendors from which local election authorities could choose, and imposed voter registration standards that were confusing and ridiculous. Voters of Ohio ended up challenging his capricious rulings in federal court on the day of the last Presidential election. He even tried to inject more confusion into the process by specifying the ``weight of paper'' used for voter registration forms when his own office was not using that kind of paper. His goal was clear: to create more confusion on election day by churning the electorate in key precincts to diminish turnout.

Congress passed the Help America Vote Act following the 2000 elections to fix these kinds of heavy-handed tactics and the mess America witnessed with the hanging chad ballots in Florida. Unfortunately, the bill did not mandate standards for the new equipment. To this day, and I believe purposefully by the Republican majority, no federal agency assures standards for voting technology on which localities can depend.

Voting rights stand at the top of our liberty pillar. We must pass this Voting Rights Act in its strongest form and restore America's trust in elections by ensuring their legitimacy and making them tamper-proof.

Mr. Chairman, before closing I would like to repeat a call that has been made by countless leaders of the civil rights movement including the Reverend Joseph Lowery, ``Keep hope alive: Extend the Voting Rights Act.''

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