Backers of the voter photo-ID bill passed by the legislature last year and thrown out by the courts say they’ll have a new proposal this year. The state supreme court threw out last year’s law because it put an undue burden on voters who had to round up adequate documents to prove their identity before they could get an identity card. Backers had argued the law was needed to eliminate voter fraud. But the court said in its ruling there had been only one instance of POSSIBLE fraud since 2002 and it might have been a mistake, and an action the law would not have covered anyway. State Senator Delbert Scott of Lowry City sponsored last year’s bill and says he’s working on something for 2007. This year’s bill won’t affect elections until 2008, unlike last year’s bill which went into effect on August 28th and would have required picture identification for the November election. He says it will be interesting to see who the opponents are and what the opposition is. County clerks and the Democratic party were the biggest opponents last year, complaining the requirement was going into effect too soon. Scott says finding a way for the state to pay the costs of obtaining the supporting documents is a key issue. He also says the bill should be broadened to attack registration fraud. He says St. Louis and Kansas City saw huge registration fraud that caused massive operations problems for election authorities in both cities. Scott has given no timetable for the introduction of his new proposal.
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