Higher ID requirements increase security, but also improve republican result b/c democratic voters are less likely to have certain IDs (I think). As a result this can be spun either way as Republicans restricting voters, or Democrats opposing countermeasures to fraud.
Personally I don't know, I think I'd focus on Democrat behaviour; Given they just got off the back of Russia-gate, and accusing a foreign superpower of interfering in the election, they should also theoretically have a stake in voter fraud. I'd expect them to be focusing more on driving their demographics to acquire ID, rather than loosening requirements. Mail-in voting is a hard one though.
As an aside - I'm unconvinced by reports that voter fraud are low. No evidence of fraud isn't evidence of no fraud, and too many news articles or "explainers" seem to focus on lack of evidence versus a secure and airtight verification process.
election officials .. referred only an estimated 30 incidents of suspected noncitizen voting.. In other words, improper noncitizen votes accounted for 0.0001 percent of the 2016 votes in those jurisdictions.
Forty of the jurisdictions .. reported no known incidents of noncitizen voting..
In the ten counties with the largest populations of noncitizens in 2016, only one reported any instances of noncitizen voting..
In .. the states where Trump claimed the problem of noncitizen voting was especially acute — no official we spoke with identified an incident of noncitizen voting in 2016
The headline claims "no noncitizen voting" but the actual process implies "no noncitizen voting, that officials know about, (or are willing to say)". What it doesn't account for is incompetence, poor vetting/fraud detection and complicity among officials. For the strong claims coming from self-proclaimed voting experts, I'd expect some kind of random sampling of votes, not "we asked the people who counted the votes" - well, they're not likely to condemn their own reports, are they? The fact that a lot of hot air and political context is upfront, and self-critical analysis of their own process is not is what makes me doubtful of these kind of text, despite the credentials/qualifications of the authors.
You're asking people to spend a lot of time, money, and political capital, on an issue that you admit there is little to no evidence is actually a problem. I'm sorry, but that is not reasonable or realistic. I understand the whole issue of "no evidence of fraud doesn't mean no fraud" but if we treated every problem like this we would never run out of problems. When you combine all of what I just said with the fact that we know certain groups are disproportionately effected by these rules...it just comes across as you saying "yes I know there's no evidence that this is a serious problem but I care more about the process being abstractly and theoretically perfect than the people these rule changes would actually effect."
> on an issue that you admit there is little to no evidence is actually a problem
Because "no evidence" isn't relevant. If it was, no one would care about Trumps taxes; and the IRS would happily decrease reporting requirements, and work on an honour system.
The mechanism by which the ruling powers of the nation are decided is pretty important, so the requirement on "time, money, and political capital" is not at un unreasonable - it isn't important if "we treated every problem like this.." because every problem is not equally as important.
The fact is there are huge incentives to cheat, and undeveloped nations across the world are characterised by unfair elections, it's not unreasonable, then, to place importance on the veracity of the election process, more than just a glib "there's no evidence that this is a serious problem".
> I care more about the process being abstractly and theoretically perfect than the people these rule changes would actually effect
fairness is dictated by the rules you dismiss as "abstract and theoretical". You talks about "facts" and what "we know", but that is the very issue - what we don't know. It's convenient to discount the value of what we don't know when the current worldview favours your opinion. I don't know anything about undetected fraud, and neither do you; neither of us know how much a problem this is, or who/how it affects people. The only solution is an airtight process, and you seem to dismiss that, worse still, attempting to characterise me as unsympathetic for placing value on such a thing.
The US is the richest country in the world, and it's government richer than most nations of the world. Why should it lack the resources to secure the most significant process in the nation, while poorer corporations (mastercard, veritas etc), and even the military can secure their own, lesser processes much better.
My local concert venue could sign their tickets with 4096-bit RSA, and make us take our shoes off and go through an x-ray before we come in like at an airport. They could have an airtight process; it would stop almost nothing, while making the process far more difficult for patrons.
Yes, I dismiss your desire for an airtight process, because I think it's security theater, whose actual outcomes would be massive and largely detrimental relative to the actual desired outcomes.
I am talking about the usefulness of security theater on the margins. At a concert venue, and at a polling place, we can do things that, in the abstract, increase security, but provide little to no actual benefit and actually serve to make the process more difficult and unpleasant on the whole.
(Ignoring RSA tangent, making all concert-goers go through an X-Ray to screen for weapons and drugs would catch more weapons and drugs than the current pat down/bag check process does. It would undeniably increase the security of the venue, while slowing down entry, exposing concertgoers to X-Rays, and IMO providing more annoyance than actual extra security)
It seems that you think, for voting, that's a fine trade-off. I do not.
edit: not disagreeing that signed tickets would prevent fraud. Disagreeing that it would be worth, say, an additional $5 fee on the tickets, plus slower more expensive readers to verify that they're signed correctly, plus plus plus etc etc. My entire argument here is based on the net utility of additional security measures, not whether or not those measures provide additional security.
Security theatre often refers to security from physical threat. I'm not talking about undetected fraud in a sense where that makes sense, but rather a verifiable, auditable process.
The only thing you referred to that was process related (versus physical security) was use of encryption keys. Why not talk about the pros/cons of that?
> It seems that you think, for voting, that's a fine trade-off
With respect to x-ray screens? Not at all, nor did I say such a thing. Nor do I think all things that could be described as "security" are exactly equivalent to each other, such that you can mention x-ray scans, and the argument automatically extends to RSA keys.
...I'm putting myself in the shoes of a person who is in the united states without authorization...and with that in mind, why in the world would I risk exposing myself and my illegal status by participating in something as pointless as voting in US elections...
I just don't see how an average person concerned with being deported is willing to risk exposing themselves by registering with the state government, especially in the last 8 years of ICE really pushing the limits on what they can do.
You conflate election fraud (hacking machines), voter fraud (individuals illicitly casting ballots), and state-sponsored misinformation campaigns. Those are three distinct problems with very different challenges.
You say "no evidence of $x != evidence of (not x)" which is true in theory, but let's step into reality: "No evidence, despite systems built to detect evidence".
You act as if people aren't already on the lookout for fraud, or that systems are not already resistant to them.
Here's the crux: https://www.npr.org/2020/06/12/873878423/voting-and-election...
Higher ID requirements increase security, but also improve republican result b/c democratic voters are less likely to have certain IDs (I think). As a result this can be spun either way as Republicans restricting voters, or Democrats opposing countermeasures to fraud.
Personally I don't know, I think I'd focus on Democrat behaviour; Given they just got off the back of Russia-gate, and accusing a foreign superpower of interfering in the election, they should also theoretically have a stake in voter fraud. I'd expect them to be focusing more on driving their demographics to acquire ID, rather than loosening requirements. Mail-in voting is a hard one though.
As an aside - I'm unconvinced by reports that voter fraud are low. No evidence of fraud isn't evidence of no fraud, and too many news articles or "explainers" seem to focus on lack of evidence versus a secure and airtight verification process.
consider https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/nonc... :
The headline claims "no noncitizen voting" but the actual process implies "no noncitizen voting, that officials know about, (or are willing to say)". What it doesn't account for is incompetence, poor vetting/fraud detection and complicity among officials. For the strong claims coming from self-proclaimed voting experts, I'd expect some kind of random sampling of votes, not "we asked the people who counted the votes" - well, they're not likely to condemn their own reports, are they? The fact that a lot of hot air and political context is upfront, and self-critical analysis of their own process is not is what makes me doubtful of these kind of text, despite the credentials/qualifications of the authors.reply