 Republican-controlled state legislatures across the country have introduced and passed a number of anti-LGBTQ-plus bills this year. Now, most of those bills are anti-trans, so it is more important than ever for transgender and non-binary people to get out and vote these bigots out of office. The problem is that many of them may be subject to voter suppression, namely due to voter ID laws that are already on the books. Now these apply to trans people in a disproportionate way and also people of color, specifically because of the unique circumstances that trans and non-binary people face. So as Daniel Villarreal of LGBTQ Nation explains, new research from the Williams Institute found that out of 878,300 eligible transgender voters in the United States, as many as 203,700 could be blocked from voting because their government-issued IDs don't reflect their gender identity. That's nearly one-fourth of all eligible trans voters. If a trans person arrives at a polling place with a government-issued ID containing an incorrect gender or name, they may be turned away by poll workers who think they're trying to impersonate another individual. According to the Movement Advancement Project, 10 states require documentation from a medical provider in order to change a trans person's gender marker. 8 states require proof of surgery, court order, or an amended birth certificate, and 10 states have burdensome or unclear policies on changing such gender markers, changing a birth certificate to get a new ID can also present problems. 12 states require trans people to undergo a gender-affirming surgery before officials will revise a birth certificate. 4 states don't allow any changing of birth certificate gender markers whatsoever. An estimated 414,000 eligible trans voters live in the 31 states that predominantly have in-person voting and require voter ID. Nearly half of trans voters in those states don't have an ID that accurately reflects their gender or name. Additionally, 64,800 eligible trans voters live in states that have very strict voter ID laws. So because of these voter ID laws, there are a lot of trans and non-binary people who may not be able to vote out the bigots who are trying to legislate them out of existence. Just think about that for a moment. Before you ask this question, no, this isn't some unintended consequence of these voter ID laws. The intended goal is voter suppression because Republican voters disproportionately are more likely to have a voter ID compared to Democratic Party voters. So the goal is to indirectly suppress the votes of Democrats because what Republicans know is that if turnout is lower, if they could have less people turn out, then their chances of winning will increase. So it's despicable, but this is something that Americans have been dealing with in red states in particular for a very long time. As the ACLU explains, millions of Americans don't have government-issued photo identification and getting one costs money even if they're free. So for example, if you need a birth certificate to get your free identification card but you don't have your birth certificate, well it costs money to obtain your birth certificate. And this has been proven as an effective way to reduce turnout, at least a little bit, disproportionately turnout of black voters. Now generally, these laws do affect black voters in particular who disproportionately do not have IDs compared to their white counterparts. Now an MIT study found that black Americans get questions about their IDs more than white voters. And in 2021, judges in North Carolina struck down a voter ID law saying that it was tainted with racial bias and used by Republicans as a way to remain in power. Now they pitch this as a way to prevent fraud and they don't necessarily want to make it more difficult to vote, but that is indeed the case. When they claim that these laws are needed to prevent fraud, they're searching for a solution for a problem that doesn't exist. And they know that. They can see the statistics and see that widespread voter fraud is actually not a thing that's happening in the United States. If you see a case here and there, oftentimes it's usually Republicans who are committing voter fraud, but still that small number is not sufficient to change the outcome of elections. So what you need to have a robust democracy is widespread participation. But what Republicans want to do is drive down turnout by suppressing the vote because that's how they know they'll stay in power because they can't compete on the substance. They know that their policies are unpopular. It's not just, you know, this issue of trans rights and whatnot. They know that when it comes to abortion rights, the minimum wage, a lot of economic issues, they just have unpopular views. Tax cuts for the rich, they don't actually sell. So they have two strategies to try to get around that, right? The first strategy is to keep everybody distracted with these culture war issues, woke politics, cancel culture. And the other thing that they do is try to suppress the vote with these voter ID laws, among other things. So this isn't necessarily surprising, but it's something that I want us to think about. Voter ID laws, they also affect trans people in a profound way and lots of trans people may not be able to vote even if they're eligible because of these voter ID laws. So this isn't going to be surprising to anyone, but it gives us another reason to object to these voter ID laws. The only reason to have these is to stop more people from voting, period, full stop. Hello, the app today. 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