UNDATED (WSAU) The League of Women Voters says Wisconsin’s new photo I-D requirement at the polls violates the state Constitution – and the group plans a lawsuit to strike it down. The League’s attorney, Lester Pines, says the Constitution guarantees the right to vote to all Wisconsin residents over 18 with specific exceptions – and the lack of a photo I-D is not one of them.
But Marquette law professor Rick Esenberg does not believe the argument will be enough to throw out the I-D mandate. He tells the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that voters can be required to prove their residency under the Constitution. And Esenberg believes the photo I-D law legally falls under the proof-of-residency provision.
But Pines says the law denies voting rights to citizens who don’t have birth certificates for some reason – and it’s hard for those people to get I-D’s.
Senate Elections Committee chair Mary Lazich said the League did not bring up its objections before the law was passed in May. And she said lawmakers took great pains to make sure the photo I-D requirement follows both the state-and-federal constitutions. Pines says the League’s new lawsuit will be filed in Dane County Circuit Court. Esenberg says it’s a sign that opponents no longer believe they’ll win a challenge to the new law in federal court.
