Keystone Today

Reintroduced and slightly altered election legislation House Bill 1800 is scheduled for a vote in the Pennsylvania House State Government Committee on Monday, Sept. 27.

The sponsor of the bill, Pennsylvania Rep. Seth Grove (R-York) brought the bill back after Gov. Tom Wolf (D) vetoed his prior “Voting Rights Protection Act” (HB 1300) in late June, saying that provisions in it, especially a voter ID provision, were designed not to tighten up voting procedures but rather to suppress the vote. A month later, Wolf, in an interview with The Philadelphia Inquirer, reversed his position on voter ID.

Grove said that Wolf’s reevaluated stance on voter ID would have been “more welcome” when HB 1300 was moving through the General Assembly but that it was still a “productive development.”

He added that HB 1800 “protects our voting rights through three broad concepts of increased access, increased security and modernization. We know access and security are not mutually exclusive.”

The voter ID provision in the bill requires voters to show identification every time they vote. Current law requires identification only for first-time voters.

Voter ID requirements are supported by a strong majority of voters. A June Franklin & Marshall College poll showed that 74% of voters favored voter ID, and 81% favored signature matching for mail-in ballots, which is another provision in Grove's legislation.

A July nationwide poll by the Honest Elections Project showed even stronger and growing support for voter ID.

“A poll released this week from the Honest Elections Project found 81% of voters surveyed support requiring every voter to show a photo ID to cast a ballot,” according to reporting from The Hill. “The poll found support for voter ID laws rose by 4 percentage points from March to July, and it increased by 13 percentage points among Black voters surveyed.”

Updates to the Voting Rights Protection Act include a provision to improve poll worker retention and another that modernizes delivery of ballots and supplies to the Judge of Elections, according to Grove's website.

House and Senate Republican leaders, who preside over strong majorities, are also pushing a proposed constitutional amendment to mandate voter ID. Wolf cannot block the amendment if it’s approved by the voters.