{"id":2213026,"date":"2024-04-04T13:26:02","date_gmt":"2024-04-04T17:26:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/alabama-law-cracking-down-on-ballot-harvesting-challenged-as-violation-of-first-amendment\/"},"modified":"2024-04-04T13:26:34","modified_gmt":"2024-04-04T17:26:34","slug":"alabama-law-cracking-down-on-ballot-harvesting-challenged-as-violation-of-first-amendment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/alabama-law-cracking-down-on-ballot-harvesting-challenged-as-violation-of-first-amendment\/","title":{"rendered":"Legal challenge against new Alabama law on ballot harvesting citing First Amendment violation"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">26<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Falabama-law-cracking-down-on-ballot-harvesting-challenged-as-violation-of-first-amendment%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2213026&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>Several civil rights organizations, including the NAACP, have initiated legal action against a new Alabama law that criminalizes\u2062 certain types of absentee voter assistance. The lawsuit argues that the law violates constitutional amendments, the Voting Rights Act, and the Help America Vote Act of 2002. The President\u200c of\u200c the Alabama NAACP stated that the law hinders voters&#8217; access to \u200dthe ballot box. Civil rights groups, such as the NAACP, are challenging an Alabama law that criminalizes\u2062 specific absentee \u200cvoter aid. They claim the \u200blaw\u200c breaches constitutional \u200bamendments and relevant voting acts. The President of the Alabama NAACP \u200dhighlighted\u200b how this law impedes\u2064 voters&#8217; access to casting their ballots.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>A group of <a href=\"https:\/\/washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/civil-rights\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"civil rights\">civil rights<\/a> organizations has filed a lawsuit against a new <a href=\"https:\/\/washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/alabama\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"Alabama\">Alabama<\/a> law that criminalizes some forms of absentee voter assistance.<\/p>\n<p>The lawsuit \u2014 filed by the Alabama State Conference of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/naacp\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"NAACP\">NAACP<\/a>, Greater Birmingham Ministries, the League of Women Voters of Alabama, and the Alabama Disabilities Advocacy Program \u2014 claims that the law criminalizing people who receive payment or pay someone to distribute or collect absentee ballot applications is in violation of the First and 14th Amendments of the Constitution, the Voting Rights Act, and the Help America Vote Act of 2002.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSB1 takes Alabama backwards as it violates the law, restricts our basic Constitutional Amendment rights, obliterates freedom of speech,\u201d Benard Simelton, president of the Alabama State Conference of the NAACP, said in a press release. \u201cIt marginalizes voters\u2019 access to the ballot box.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The lawsuit claims that the new law negatively targets \u201chistorically disenfranchised communities\u201d that rely on civic leaders for voter assistance. <\/p>\n<p>The new law, which was signed by Gov. Kay Ivey (R-AL) on March 20,\u00a0would make it a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison for anyone who receives a payment or gift \u201cto distribute, order, request, collect, complete, pre-fill, or deliver an absentee ballot application for another voter.\u201d Those who pay someone to engage in voter assistance face a punishment of up to 10 years in prison. The lawsuit ponders if punishments could be extended to nonprofit organizations that provide voters with stamps or stickers. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cNonprofit organizations \u2026 regularly provide volunteers with items that include the organizations\u2019 message or logo, and\/or enable volunteers to provide assistance with absentee ballot applications by providing items like pens, postage, envelopes, and gas cards,\u201d the lawsuit says. \u201cThe vagueness of the term \u2018gift\u2019 is substantial, not only because it imposes steep criminal penalties based on an undefined term but also because it can be read as sweeping in expressive conduct and associational activity that implicates Plaintiffs\u2019 core political speech.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><strong>CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The lawsuit also argues the new legislation is an act of voter suppression, which will silence members of the black community. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cFor almost as long as the Fifteenth Amendment has guaranteed the right to vote for Black people and others regardless of race or color, Alabama has employed restrictions on assisting voters, including imprisoning volunteers and organizers for assisting voters, and employing other voter suppression tactics to both silence and punish Black community leaders and disenfranchise Black and other voters of color,\u201d the lawsuit notes.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Civil rights groups, including NAACP Alabama, sue over a law in Alabama criminalizing certain forms of absentee voter aid. The lawsuit, filed by various organizations, argues that the law infringes on the fundamental rights of voters to receive assistance<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2542,"featured_media":2213027,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/wex-s3.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/AP24031554071805-1024x683.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[538],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2213026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-washington-examiner"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/wex-s3.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/AP24031554071805-1024x683.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2213026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2542"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2213026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2213026\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2213027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2213026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2213026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2213026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}