After working to suppress the vote during the 2012 presidential election, the True the Vote organization, writes Brentin Mock in Colorlines, has merely changed its strategy.
This year they've jumped off with two new groups:
True the Vote NOW: A new initiative described as: "We promote ideas that actively protect the rights of legitimate voters, regardless of their political party affiliation." Basically, it's a lobbying arm that sends people to the Texas legislature to push for True the Vote's electoral reform laws. Right now, they are running with the "13 for ‘13 Legislative Recommendations," which is modeled after the 22 legislative recommendations True the Vote sent to the Texas legislature in 2011. Six of those 22 became law in Texas, including a photo voter ID law — the strictest in the nation — that was eventually ruled a violation of the Voting Rights Act by a federal court. In their new "13 for ‘13" package they've doubled-down, this time not only asking for proof of citizenship for people to register but attacking early voting. They are asking Texas legislators to trim the early voting period, allow video cameras to record and live-stream the early voting sign-in areas and voting lines, and to give early voting clerks the power to dismiss "non-performing poll workers." We'll be tracking to see how many of these become law.
Read Brentin Mock's entire piece at Colorlines.
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