November, 15 2012, 03:15pm EDT

For Immediate Release
Contact:
Elektra Gray — Communications Director
egray@demos.org | 212.485.6014
Lauren Strayer — Associate Director of Communications
lstrayer@demos.org | 212.389.1413
Web & Social Media:
Alex Amend — Online Manager
aamend@demos.org | 212.389.1411
Voters Broke Through Unprecedented Barriers on Election Day, New Analysis by Expert Tova Wang
NEW YORK
After two years of historic attacks on the freedom to vote and despite blatant efforts to suppress the vote through unnecessary obstacles and intimidation, Americans made their voices heard on Election Day, according to a new analysis by voting rights expert and Demos Senior Democracy Fellow Tova Wang. "Lessons Learned from the 2012 Election: How Voters Stood Up Against Suppression, ID Laws, and Intimidation" details the impact of the most flagrant barriers to the ballot enacted in recent months and how, in many states, determined voters and voting right advocates overcame those barriers.
Read the brief here: https://demos.io/WaAacs
"The right to vote is just that - a fundamental freedom at the cornerstone of American democracy," writes Wang in the brief published by the national, nonpartisan organization Demos. "In the 2012 election, that sacred value was challenged in a way we have not seen in a couple of generations, perhaps since the civil and voting rights movements of the 1960s... The measures taken were so blatant and widespread that they served to energize coalitions of citizens to fight for voting rights harder than ever, and made many voters more determined to vote and have their vote count."
Wang's detailed analysis, which includes a pro-voter reform agenda, surveys the best and worst news from Election Day, including the complicated impact of voter ID laws across the country. Despite wins for voting rights advocates in several states where laws were struck down or enjoined for this election, four states had strict photo ID laws in force on November 6th--Kansas, Georgia, Indiana, and Tennessee. Advocates fighting the Tennessee law estimate that 390,000 registered voters in that state do not have the picture ID now required to vote in that state. Yet the state has only "issued 20,923 state IDs for voting purposes." And in Pennsylvania, the late halting of the voter ID requirement allowed for poll worker confusion: All of the polling places in Crawford County, Pennsylvania, posted signs saying that identification was required to vote. Minnesota was a bright spot for voting rights advocates, however, as voters rejected a voter ID ballot measure and protected Same Day Registration.
"Lessons Learned from the 2012 Election" also highlights:
- Provisional Ballots: When voters are not on the rolls, they are often instructed to cast a provisional ballot; however, several states -- such as Florida, Nevada, Iowa, and Virginia -- do not count ballots cast in the wrong precinct, even if it was through no fault of the voter.
- Challenger Groups: Despite much fanfare, groups like True the Vote mostly failed in their attempts to purge the rolls and to organize significant numbers of volunteer challengers at the polls. For example, on Election Day, the Franklin County, Ohio Board of Elections determined that True the Vote may have falsified the forms submitted for election observers, who must be appointed by a group of candidates. But they did cause some trouble: right before the election The Voter Integrity Project in North Carolina challenged thousands of registrations claiming people were dead. In addition to wasting the time of already stressed elections officials who threw many of the challenges out because the data matching the group used was so flawed, hundreds of people in NC had to prove they weren't dead to the BOE.
- Early Voting: According to reports, the cutbacks in Florida's early voting hours may have reduced the number of voters who participated in early voting this year by 300,000 votes, and contributed to Florida's extraordinarily long lines at early voting sites and on Election Day.
- Felon Disenfranchisement: In addition to the nearly 6 million voters shut out by felon disenfranchisement laws, two states -- Florida and Iowa - went further in the last two years. In Florida, for example, there is a mandatory 5-year waiting time before a citizen can even apply to the governor's clemency board and there is a backlog now of over 100,000 applications awaiting action.
"The 2012 Election cycle contained blatant and widespread measures to suppress the votes of millions of American voters, particularly African American, youth, and Latino voters," said Wang. "Despite the many barriers to democracy that were thrown in their way, the American people persevered and made their voices heard. Yet there is much work to be done to ensure America becomes a more inclusive and representative democracy."
"Lessons Learned from the 2012 Elections" outlines a sensible reform agenda that would address many of the problems voters faced on November 6th. These measures include Same Day, portable and permanent registration; expansion of early voting to avoid long lines on Election Day; laws to prevent unfounded challenges and other forms of voter harassment and intimidation; and greater efforts to ensure Americans who are not proficient in English can exercise their right to vote.
Read the Analysis: https://demos.io/WaAacs
To interview Tova Wang, please see contact information above. Wang is a nationally known expert on election reform and political participation in the United States, and author of the recent Century Foundation book The Politics of Voter Suppression: Defending and Expanding Americans' Right to Vote (Cornell University Press). She is Senior Democracy Fellow at Demos, a Fellow at The Century Foundation, and a consultant to organizations working to improve democracy around the world, such as the National Democratic Institute and The Carter Center.
Demos is a think tank that powers the movement for a just, inclusive, multiracial democracy. Through cutting-edge policy research, inspiring litigation, and deep relationships with grassroots organizations, Demos champions solutions that will create a democracy and economy rooted in racial equity.
LATEST NEWS
Social Security Data Chief Who Blew Whistle on DOGE Resigns, Citing 'Culture of Fear'
Social Security Administration chief data officer Charles Borges described "fear and anxiety over potential illegal actions resulting in the loss of citizen data" in his resignation letter.
Aug 29, 2025
A federal worker who filed a shock whistleblower report alleging that employees of the Department of Government Efficiency had potentially compromised Americans' Social Security data abruptly resigned on Friday.
In a letter obtained by independent journalist Melissa Kabas, Social Security Administration (SSA) chief data officer Charles Borges said that he was "involuntarily" stepping down from his position at the agency due to "serious... mental, physical, and emotional distress" caused in the wake of his whistleblower report.
Borges said that after filing his report with the help of the Government Accountability Project, he was subjected to "exclusion, isolation, internal strife, and a culture of fear" that created a hostile work environment and made "work conditions intolerable."
Borges then recounted that he filed the whistleblower report because he was concerned that Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) employees had uploaded Americans' Social Security information onto a cloud server that he believed was vulnerable to external hackers.
"As these events unfolded, newly installed leadership in IT and executive offices created a culture of panic and dread, with minimal information sharing, frequent discussions on employee termination, and general organizational dysfunction," Borges claimed. "Executives and employees were afraid to share information or concerns on questionable activities for fear of retribution and termination."
Borges concluded by saying that the total lack of visibility into the actions of DOGE employees who were handling Americans' most sensitive data created a sense of "fear and anxiety over potential illegal actions resulting in the loss of citizen data."
The report, whose existence was made public earlier this week, contends that Borges has evidence of a wide array of wrongdoing by DOGE employees, including "apparent systemic data security violations, uninhibited administrative access to highly sensitive production environments, and potential violations of internal SSA security protocols and federal privacy laws by DOGE personnel."
At the heart of Borges' complaint is an effort by DOGE employees to make "a live copy of the country's Social Security information in a cloud environment" that "apparently lacks any security oversight from SSA or tracking to determine who is accessing or has accessed the copy of this data."
Should hackers gain access to this copy of Social Security data, the report warns, it could result in identity theft on an unprecedented scale and lead to the loss of crucial food and healthcare benefits for millions of Americans. The report states that the government may also have to give every American a new Social Security number "at great cost."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Global Sumud Flotilla Set for Latest Attempt to 'Break Israel's Illegal Siege on Gaza'
"Our boats carry more than aid. They carry a message—the siege must end. The greater danger lies not in confronting Israel at sea, but in allowing genocide to continue with impunity."
Aug 29, 2025
Palestine defenders are preparing for the latest—and largest—Freedom Flotilla Coalition mission to set sail for Gaza in an attempt to break Israel's US-backed genocidal siege on the embattled Palestinian territory.
Dozens of boats carrying hundreds of activists from as many as 44 nations are set to take part in the Global Sumud Flotilla—sumud means "perseverance" in Arabic—as it attempts to run Israel's naval blockade and deliver desperately needed humanitarian aid including food, medicines, and baby formula to the starving people of Gaza.
"We are a coalition of everyday people—organizers, humanitarians, doctors, artists, clergy, lawyers, and seafarers—who believe in human dignity and the power of nonviolent action," Global Sumud Flotilla's website explains.
In addition to "everyday people," flotilla participants include Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, American actress Susan Sarandon, Irish actor Liam Cunningham, leftist Portuguese parliamentarian Mariana Mortágua, former Barcelona Mayor Ada Colau, and Mandla Mandela, the grandson of former South African President Nelson Mandela.
Israel "is starving and killing the people of Gaza," Mandela—whose grandfather was not only a hero of his country's anti-apartheid struggle but also a staunch supporter of Palestinian liberation—said Friday on behalf of the South African flotilla delegation. "We are a diverse group of international activists calling for urgent global action to compel Israel to open Gaza's borders to aid and end its genocide of the Palestinian people."
"We ask that South Africans of conscience join us," he added. South Africa is leading an ongoing genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague that is officially or informally supported by around two dozen nations.
Colau said earlier this week that "to end the genocide in Gaza is the duty of all of us, so we have to do what is in our power to do it if governments, including the government of Spain, do not do what they can to stop the criminal state of Israel."
Spain has joined the ICJ genocide case against Israel, has formally recognized Palestinian statehood and urged other nations to do so, and has taken significant steps toward an arms embargo on Israel.
"Although Spain has positioned itself more than other governments and recognized the Palestinian state, words are not enough when thousands of children are being killed," Colau said Friday in an interview with RTE.
At least 18,500 children are among the more than 63,000 Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in Gaza since October 2023—although the official Gaza Health Ministry figures are likely a vast undercount, according to peer-reviewed studies.
"This is my third attempt to try to sail with humanitarian aid to break Israel's illegal siege on Gaza and open up a humanitarian corridor," Thunberg, who is a member of the flotilla steering committee, told Middle East Eye Thursday.
"There have been 38 previous attempts just for the Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC) and now with the Global Sumud Flotilla," Thunberg continued. "This is unprecedented. We are mobilizing people from all over the world with dozens of boats sailing from Barcelona first, and then more boats joining us from other ports around the Mediterranean Sea."
"We are doing this because we are facing a genocide," she added. "We are seeing people being deliberately deprived of their basic means to sustain life. And this is a continuation of the suffocating oppression that Palestinians have been living under for decades, and we simply have no choice if we have any sense of humanity left, we cannot just sit by and watch this unfolding."
The Gaza Famine—officially declared last week by the authoritative Integrated Food Security Phase Classification—has claimed at least hundreds of Palestinian lives in what experts say is an engineered effort by Israel. The International Criminal Court arrest warrants issued last year for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who ordered the "complete siege" on Gaza fueling the famine, list forced starvation, along with murder, as alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes committed by the pair.
Earlier this year, the FFC vessels Conscience, Madleen, and Handala each separately tried to break the blockade but were thwarted by Israeli forces in international waters, an apparent violation of maritime law. Flotilla activists were beaten, kidnapped, jailed, interrogated, and deported by Israel.
Fifteen years ago, Israeli forces raided one of the first FFC convoys carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza. The Israeli attackers killed nine volunteers aboard the MV Mavi Marmara, including Turkish-American teenager Furkan Doğan.
The Sumud Flotilla comes as Israeli forces ramp up Operation Gideon's Chariots 2, a campaign of conquest, occupation, and ethnic cleansing of Gaza backed by the administration of US President Donald Trump. On Thursday, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich proposed the systematic annexation of Gaza over the coming months if Hamas keeps fighting, as well as the implementation of Trump's plan to ethnically cleanse the Palestinian exclave and transform it into the "Riviera of the Middle East."
Israel's siege of Gaza has been in effect in varying degrees of severity since 2006 in response to Hamas' rise to power in the strip.
"The idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger," a senior adviser to then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said at the time.
Now Palestinians are dying of hunger, and the world has increasingly had enough.
"Our boats carry more than aid," Global Sumud Flotilla said. "They carry a message—the siege must end. The greater danger lies not in confronting Israel at sea, but in allowing genocide to continue with impunity."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Economists Warn Trump Attack on Fed Will Further Jack Prices for Working Families
"Confidence that the Fed will respond wisely to future periods of macroeconomic stress... will evaporate," warned one economist.
Aug 29, 2025
Economists are warning that US President Donald Trump's efforts to meddle with the Federal Reserve are going to wind up raising prices even further on working families.
Michael Madowitz, principal economist at the Roosevelt Institute, said on Wednesday that the president's efforts to strong-arm the US central bank into lowering interest rates by firing Federal Reserve Gov. Lisa Cook would backfire by accelerating inflation.
"The administration's efforts to politicize interest rates—an authoritarian tactic—will ultimately hurt American families by driving up costs," he said. "That helps explain why Fed independence has helped keep inflation under 3%, while, after years of political interference in their central bank, Turkey's inflation rate is over 33%."
Heidi Shierholz, the president of the Economic Policy Institute, said that the president's move to fire Cook "radically undermines what Trump says his own goal is: lowering U.S. interest rates to spur faster economic growth."
She then gave a detailed explanation for why Trump imposing his will on the Federal Reserve would likely bring economic pain.
"Presidential capture of the Fed would signal to decision-makers throughout the economy that interest rates will no longer be set on the basis of sound data or economic conditions—but instead on the whims of the president," she argued. "Confidence that the Fed will respond wisely to future periods of macroeconomic stress—either excess inflation or unemployment—will evaporate."
This lack of confidence, she continued, would manifest in investors in US Treasury bonds demanding higher premiums due to the higher risks they will feel they are taking when buying US debt, which would only further drive up the nation's borrowing costs.
"These higher long-term rates will ripple through the economy—making mortgages, auto loans, and credit card payments higher for working people—and require that rates be held higher for longer to tamp down any future outbreak of inflation," she said. "In the first hours after Trump's announcement, all of these worries seemed to be coming to pass."
Economist Paul Krugman, a former columnist for The New York Times, wrote on his personal Substack page Thursday that Trump's moves to take control of the Federal Reserve were "shocking and terrifying."
"Trump's campaign to take over monetary policy has shifted from a public pressure to personal intimidation of Fed officials: the attack on Cook signals that Trump and his people will try to ruin the life of anyone who stands in his way," he argued. "There is now a substantial chance that the Fed's independence, its ability to manage the nation's monetary policy on an objective, technocratic basis rather than as an instrument of the president's political interests and personal whims, will soon be gone."
The economists' warnings come as economic data released on Friday revealed that core inflation rose to 2.9% in August, which is the highest annual rate recorded since this past February. Earlier this month, the Producer Price Index, which is considered a leading indicator of future inflation, came in at 3.3%, which was significantly higher than economists' consensus estimate of 2.5%.
Data aggregated by polling analyst G. Elliott Morris shows that inflation is far and away Trump's biggest vulnerability, as American voters give him a net approval of -23% on that issue.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular