Voting Wars: Rights | Power | Privilege

Check out our full coverage of Voting Wars

2016-08-22T18:43:06Z

Since the last presidential election, politicians in 20 states have passed dozens of new voting laws, which means millions of Americans will face unprecedented requirements to vote.

Check out our full project here.

And here’s the news release:

The Carnegie-Knight News21 program, a national multi-university reporting initiative headquartered at Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, released a major investigation Saturday into the issues surrounding voting rights in America.

Thirty-one students from 18 universities traveled to 31 states and interviewed hundreds of individuals to produce “Voting Wars.” The project is at votingwars.news21.com.

Portions of the investigation will be published by major media partners, including The Washington Post, nbcnews.com, USA Today Network, The Dallas Morning News and The Philadelphia Inquirer, plus a number of nonprofit online news sites affiliated with the Investigative News Network. In all, more than 100 media properties will publish portions of the investigation.

“‘Voting Wars’ fills a void in the election coverage,” said Carnegie-Knight News21 Executive Editor Jacquee Petchel, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist. “In the last couple of years, we’ve seen a number of legal decisions involving voting rights that impact the election process. Our fellows really rose to a significant challenge to shine a light on an important national issue.”

Petchel supervised the student reporters’ investigative project with a team of award-winning journalists who serve on the faculty of the Cronkite School. They include Leonard Downie Jr., former executive editor of The Washington Post and Cronkite’s Weil Family Professor of Journalism; Pulitzer Prize-winning data specialist Steve Doig, the Knight Chair in Journalism; Christina Leonard, director of Cronkite’s Reynolds Business Reporting Bureau; Rebecca Blatt, director of the Cronkite News Digital Production Bureau; Theresa Poulson, director of the Public Insight Network Bureau; and Cronkite School faculty associate Brandon Quester.

Work on the project started in January with a video-conference seminar on voting issues taught by Downie and Petchel. Students heard from experts on the topic of voting rights, analyzed data, researched topics and conducted interviews around the country.

From late May to the end of July, the student journalists completed a 10-week fellowship, working out of Cronkite School newsroom on the ASU Downtown Phoenix campus. They crossed the country in multimedia reporting teams, examining the political divide between citizens with significant voting power and those without, particularly in disadvantaged communities.

Carnegie-Knight News21 is designed to give students experience producing in-depth news coverage on critical issues facing the nation, using innovative digital methods to distribute the content on multiple platforms. The fellows shot hundreds of photos, 30-plus videos and several in-depth short documentaries for “Voting Wars.”

“One the most gratifying aspects of News21 is the enormous growth of the student journalists from January to August each year,” Downie said. “Although much of the nation’s news media has been covering voting rights during this election campaign, the News21 students produced professional-quality stories, multimedia and data analysis that cannot be found anywhere else, which is why so many media partners are interested in publishing their work.”

The project follows up and expands on a 2012 investigation on voting rights that won numerous awards, including the First Amendment Award from Society of Professional Journalists and a National Media Award from the National Association of Black Journalists. That project included the most exhaustive study ever of American election fraud, discovering only 10 cases of in-person voter fraud between 2000 and 2012.

Petchel said the school decided to revisit the issue because of recent court rulings such as Shelby County v. Holder in 2013, which struck down a section of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that required certain states to obtain federal approval before changing voting laws.

For the 2016 investigation, students examined voting laws in all 50 states. They tallied dozens of new voting laws in 20 states and found that laws were nine times more likely to be passed by Republican-led legislatures than those controlled by Democrats.

Carnegie-Knight News21 fellows traveled to these states to talk with voters impacted by the new laws and reported in states that were battlegrounds in the civil rights movement. One of them, Cronkite graduate student Lily Altavena, a Carnegie-Knight News21 Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation Fellow, reported from Arkansas, Louisiana, Michigan and Mississippi as well as from the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. She was part of a reporting team that covered how lawmakers have stripped locally elected school board members of their power, leaving parents without a voice.

Altavena, who hopes to become an education reporter, said the Carnegie-Knight News21 investigation helped her gain valuable experience. “I got to do the reporting that I’ve always wanted to do,” she said. “I’ve been given some really amazing reporting opportunities.”

Over the past seven years, Carnegie-Knight News21 projects have included investigations into post-9/11 veterans, marijuana laws and guns in America, among other topics. The projects have won numerous awards, including four EPPY Awards from Editor & Publisher magazine, the first Student Edward R. Murrow Award for video excellence and a host of honors from the Society of Professional Journalists and the Hearst Awards Program, considered the Pulitzer Prizes of collegiate journalism.

The universities participating in the 2016 Carnegie-Knight News21 program are Arizona State University, Elon University, Florida International University, Hampton University, Kent State University, Louisiana State University, St. Bonaventure University, Syracuse University, Texas Christian University, University of British Columbia, University of Florida, University of Maryland, University of Nevada, Reno; University of North Texas, University of Oklahoma, University of Oregon, University of Tennessee and University of Texas at Austin. The fellows are:

Lily Altavena, ASU
Alex Amico, Syracuse University
Alejandra Armstrong, ASU
Lian Bunny, St. Bonaventure University
Elizabeth Campbell, Texas Christian University
Andrew Clark, University of Oklahoma
Nicole Cobler, University of Texas at Austin
Courtney Columbus, ASU
Hillary Davis, ASU
Sami Edge, University of Oregon
Erin Fox, ASU
Max Garland, Elon University
Taylor Gilmore, University of Tennessee
Natalie Griffin, University of Maryland
Marianna Hauglie , ASU
Sean Holstege, ASU
Pinar Istek, University of Texas at Austin
Phillip Jackson, Hampton University
Roman Knertser, Syracuse University
Mike Lakusiak, University of British Columbia
Emily Mahoney, ASU
Jimmy Miller, Kent State University
Emily Mills, Kent State University
Michael Olinger, University of Nevada, Reno
Pamela Ortega, University of Oklahoma
Kathryn Peifer, ASU
Jeffrey Pierre, Florida International University
Sarah Pitts, University of Oklahoma
Amber Reece, University of North Texas
Ali Schmitz, University of Florida
Rose Velazquez, Louisiana State University

Carnegie-Knight News21 fellows are supported by their universities as well as a variety of foundations and philanthropists. The Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation supports the three University of Oklahoma fellows as well as three fellows – Altavena, Armstrong and Holstege – from ASU.

The Donald W. Reynolds Foundation supports Columbus, Hauglie and Peifer of ASU, and the Hearst Foundations supports the fellowships of Davis and Fox, both from ASU. Louis A. “Chip” Weil provides support for ASU’s Mahoney.

Olinger from the University of Nevada, Reno, is supported by the Fred W. Smith Chair at UNR. Reece from the University of North Texas is supported by The Dallas Morning News. The Diane Laney Fitzpatrick Fellowship supports Miller from Kent State University, and the David Dix Fellowship supports Mills from Kent State University.

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation: Knight Foundation supports transformational ideas that promote quality journalism, advance media innovation, engage communities and foster the arts. We believe that democracy thrives when people and communities are informed and engaged. For more, visit knightfoundation.org.

The Carnegie Corporation of New York: The Carnegie Corporation of New York, which was established by Andrew Carnegie in 1911 “to promote the advancement and diffusion of knowledge and understanding,” is one of the oldest, largest and most influential American grant-making foundations. The foundation makes grants to promote international peace and to advance education and knowledge

The Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation: The Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation, headquartered in Oklahoma City, was founded by Edith Kinney Gaylord, the daughter of Daily Oklahoman Publisher E.K. Gaylord. Ms. Gaylord created the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation in 1982 to improve the quality of journalism by supporting research and creative projects that promote excellence and foster high ethical standards in journalism.

Hearst Foundations: The Hearst Foundations are national philanthropic resources for organizations and institutions working in the fields of education, health, culture and social service. Their goal is to ensure that people of all backgrounds have the opportunity to build healthy, productive and inspiring lives. The charitable goals of the Foundations reflect the philanthropic interests of William Randolph Hearst.

The Donald W. Reynolds Foundation: The Donald W. Reynolds Foundation is a national philanthropic organization founded in 1954 by the late media entrepreneur for whom it is named. Headquartered in Las Vegas, it has committed more than $115 million nationwide through its journalism program.

Louis A. “Chip” Weil: Weil served as president and chief executive officer for Central Newspaper Inc., which owned The Arizona Republic. Prior to becoming CEO, he was president and publisher of the Detroit News and publisher of Time magazine. Weil and his wife Daryl established the Weil Family Professorship at the Cronkite School.

Expert: Supreme Court erred by striking down key provision of the Voting Rights Act

2016-08-19T22:43:42Z

Edith Ingram, 74, is just called “The Judge” by many people in Sparta, Georgia, after being elected in 1968 as the first black probate judge in the United States. On her first day of work, white men stood at the base of the courthouse and threatened to shoot her in the back if she walked up the steps. She did anyway, and she remained in office for over three decades. (Photo by Roman Knertser/News21)

PHOENIX – November’s presidential election will be the first since the U.S. Supreme Court knocked down a key provision in the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

Three years ago, the monumental Supreme Court decision began allowing many states across the country to pass a wave of new laws that add requirements to vote, including requiring photo identification at the polls. State leaders say the new rules are part of an effort to curb voter fraud and keep elections fair.

A California Institute of Technology study released in 2015 evaluated the high court’s logic in its decision and provided “an absolute rebuttal,” according to the study’s author, J. Morgan Kousser.

Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act had required states and local jurisdictions with a history of discrimination, mostly in the South and Southwest, to “preclear” voting-related changes through the federal government.

Section 5 had survived previous court challenges, and the Republican Congress renewed the Voting Rights Act in 2006.

But when Chief Justice Roberts read his majority opinion in Shelby County v. Holder in June 2013, the decision dramatically altered the voting landscape.

The court struck down Section 4 of the act, which outlined the requirements for which areas fell under Section 5. As a result, the preclearance provision was rendered useless.

In the opinion, Roberts acknowledged that while voting discrimination was “rampant” in the South in the 1960s, “today’s statistics tell an entirely different story.” He said the South was being unfairly targeted by anti-discrimination laws based on a “fortuitous relationship.”

Kousser, a professor of history and social science, looked into these assertions. He found that since the passage of the Voting Rights Act until the Supreme Court decision, the Section 4-covered areas had a much higher number of voting rights violations and election rule changes as a result of Department of Justice intervention or litigation. This concentration of law changes in the areas covered by Section 4 also has not decreased over time, according to the study.

Of the more than 3,800 times county-level voting rules were overturned from 1957 to 2014, 91.7 percent of them were in places covered by Section 4, according to the study.

“A government program that works 91 percent of the time,” Kousser said during a phone interview with News21. “(The authors of the Voting Rights Act) understood very well where the infractions and discriminations were likely to take place.”

Because the Shelby County ruling dispensed with preclearance, previously covered states don’t need to notify the federal government of changes to voting rules before they implement them, meaning the only way for the Department of Justice to dismantle a potentially discriminatory law is to file suit after the law has been passed.

In a July speech to a national Latino rights advocacy group, U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said Shelby County struck down “the heart of the Voting Rights Act.”

The decision was 5-4. But because Justice Antonin Scalia has since died, the court now has an even 4-4 split between liberals and conservatives. And ongoing litigation over new state laws may reach the Supreme Court.

Thus far, liberal judges in federal courts have been more likely to overturn new state voting laws, saying they disenfranchise minority voters who often have limited access to things like government-issued IDs and reliable transportation. Support for new voting requirements has largely come from Republicans.

November’s presidential election could decide much of this national debate. The new president will likely nominate a justice to fill the high court’s empty seat.

But to many, today’s debate over voting access is not new. The Voting Rights Act is considered one of the pinnacle achievements of the civil rights movement and was the beginning of the end for Jim Crow laws that kept many African-Americans from the ballot.

Edith Ingram was elected the first black probate judge in the nation in 1968, in a small, impoverished town called Sparta, Georgia, that wasn’t racially integrated until the ‘70s. Georgia is among several states embroiled in civil rights lawsuits over its removal of some voters from registration rolls and its proof-of-citizenship requirements to register.

“When you have a people who don’t realize where they came from and the history of what has happened, they don’t know where they’re going,” Ingram said. “Now, those young black people and some of the older people are giving our gains back faster than we got ‘em. And if they ever get their foot on our necks again, it’s going to be another 50 years before we rise again.”

Come back Aug. 20 to see the full News21 report on “Voting Wars.”

Salt Lake County Clerk focuses on young residents in voter registration efforts

2016-08-19T22:44:03Z

SALT LAKE CITY – When Sherrie Swensen first ran for Salt Lake County Clerk in 1990, she was frustrated with the voter registration system. After taking office, she began putting voter registration forms everywhere she could – in grocery stores, laundromats, apartment complexes – anywhere that would let her use counter space.

“I decided that I was going to make voter registration available and accessible to everyone I could,” Swensen said. “And it worked. We registered people in record numbers. I did outreach at boat shows and home improvement shows and high schools, senior centers and basically just approaching people and offering that and helping them get registered to vote.”

Swensen said she was especially interested in getting young people registered.

“I often would say to them, ‘We are making decisions that will affect your world for a lot longer than it will affect my world. And you need to care, and you need to be registered to vote. You need to look at candidates and issues and decide what matters to you,’” she said.

Come back Aug. 20 to see the full News21 report on “Voting Wars.”

Preview: Who can vote in America?

2016-08-22T18:44:10Z

Preview News21’s 2016 project, Voting Wars, launching Aug. 20.

Civil rights leader looks back at his time in Selma, Ala.

2016-08-19T22:44:26Z

Bernard LaFayette (News21)

ATLANTA – By 22, Bernard LaFayette already had participated in the Freedom Rides, the Nashville lunch counter sit-ins and been jailed in multiple states for his protest efforts.

LaFayette and his roommate, now U.S. Congressman John Lewis, became leaders of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, a civil rights organization created by black students at colleges throughout the country.

In 1962, he went to Atlanta to receive a new job assignment at the group’s headquarters. LaFayette wanted to lead a project, not assist. And there was one place left: Selma, Alabama.

The committee advised LaFayette against the move, especially because the White Citizens’ Council and the Ku Klux Klan were active in the town, LaFayette told News21.

African-Americans who tried to register to vote often faced intimidation, and Alabama required citizens to take a literacy test to register to vote. In some counties, including Dallas County, members of the county board of registrars graded the tests. Often, African-Americans would take the test in Selma and find out the next day they failed because the board determined they were “unqualified” to vote, civil rights leaders told News21.

Still, LaFayette said he didn’t understand why the committee was so afraid of the small Alabama city.

“What is it that caused Selma to be so different?” he said. “This little place in Alabama that nobody had ever heard of before – they’re saying nothing can be done. The white folks are too mean. How are they meaner than other white folks?”

His first weeks in Selma were tough.

A white man attacked LaFayette outside of his home, LaFayette said. The man asked LaFayette for help after his car broke down. The man pushed LaFayette to the ground and hit him with a gun. LaFayette credits a neighbor who witnessed the attack for saving his life.

LaFayette said he was one of three civil rights activists targeted in a multistate conspiracy. While he and Louisiana activist Elton Cox lived, Medgar Evers, the NAACP Mississippi chapter’s executive field secretary, was shot and killed in Jackson, Mississippi.

After the attack, African-Americans in Selma were shocked, and they vowed to fight for civil rights. Local black church leaders banded together to encourage their congregations to register to vote. People began to go in larger groups to attempt to register.

Law enforcement officers repeatedly beat protesters with billy clubs and whips. People would volunteer to prevent African-Americans in Selma from registering to vote, according to historical accounts.

LaFayette began going into rural areas surrounding Selma and training illiterate sharecroppers for the literacy test. In Wilcox County, they passed – even though many of them couldn’t sign their own name.

After less than two years in Selma, LaFayette left to finish his degree and start a family with his wife. He came back many times to lead protests and organize rallies. In fact, LaFayette helped plan the 1965 march from Selma to Montgomery.

That same year, Congress passed the Voting Rights Act to protect disenfranchised voters.

“I’m very proud of what we have done so far. We have these impediments, and we have these knee-jerk things, but we have made some great progress in this country,” LaFayette said. “I don’t want to see us lose that.”

LaFayette, 76, is now the chairman of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference’s board of directors. He said he’s disappointed in the current state of voting rights in the country. While he places some of the blame on the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to strike down a section of the Voting Rights Act that had required certain state and local governments to get all election laws pre-cleared by the U.S. Department of Justice, he said the Voting Rights Act was never strong enough.

He believes the act should have required jurisdictions to hold regular workshops or meetings to discuss the policies going through state legislatures or Congress. He said this could have prevented laws like Alabama’s voter identification law from taking effect.

“If you get the wrong people in the positions of power, you can go backwards just like you did during (the) reconstruction period,” he said.

LaFayette still insists that voting matters today, and it always will.

“Let’s hope that we learn that not only do we change laws, we try to change and put programs together and experiences together so that we can change the hearts of people,” LaFayette said. “If you change the hearts of people, then the laws can also be changed.”

Come back Aug. 20 to see the full News21 report on “Voting Wars.”

Native Americans’ long path to voting equality in New Mexico

2016-08-19T18:28:20Z

GALLUP, N.M. – It wasn’t long ago that Native Americans in New Mexico didn’t have the right to vote or the ability to run for office. Now, Native Americans have greater representation among elected officials there than in most states.

Congress extended citizenship and voting rights to all Native Americans in 1924. However, states still retained the ability to define voter eligibility. In 1962, New Mexico was the last state to grant Native Americans the right to vote.

Currently, Native Americans make up more than 10 percent of the population in New Mexico, according the U.S. Census Bureau. That means they have the ability to impact election outcomes because of their concentration within certain areas in the state, according to Daniel C. McCool, a professor at the University of Utah who studies lawsuits involving Native Americans.

News21 traveled through New Mexico and spoke to tribal members about voting. Here are some of their responses:

Gloria Skeet

“When they talk about minorities, it seems to me it’s Hispanic and black or just black and white, and Native Americans are left out a lot,” said Gloria Skeet, who manages the chapter house at Bááháálí on the Navajo reservation south of Gallup.

Gloria Skeet outside the Bááháálí chapter house. (Mike Lakusiak/News21)

“We’re here. We’re real. And we’re here to stay,” Skeet said. “I think that a lot of the general population … think that Indians don’t exist, that we are all dead and we’re just history.”

Skeet sits on the front porch of the Bááháálí chapter house. She explained that she wasn’t as always connected to her culture and life on the reservation as she is now.

She, like many young Native Americans, left the reservation when she had the opportunity. She attended college in Minnesota.

“I grew up with no running water, no electricity, and I went to college. I was determined to finish college and, of course, my goal when I went to Minnesota was to get the hell out of here,” she said.

As the years passed, she grew homesick for the culture and community she left behind.

“I started to really miss hearing Navajo, and I missed a lot of the culture that I grew up with,” Skeet said. “When you grow up with Navajo values and the Navajo way of life, it never leaves you.”

Now she encourages young members of the chapter to become civically engaged and learn traditions through youth employment programs and a weaving program at the chapter house.

Jess Kirwin

Jess Kirwin, who has served as chapter president in the Navajo Nation’s McKinley County chapters, said older residents on the Navajo reservation often face hurdles casting their ballot in person. Members of the community go to great lengths to help, he said.

Jess Kirwin, who has been a chapter president on the Navajo Nation in New Mexico explained that tribal members ensure everyone can access polls. (Mike Lakusiak/News21)

“We have handicapped individuals, and I know our voting precinct workers there are very generous to go out to the automobile where grandma is sitting, make her vote in the vehicle and then they bring it back in and count her,” Kirwin said.

Amanda Henry

In the center of Gallup, Amanda Henry plays with her young daughter on the playground at Ford Canyon Park. She’s from the Naschitti Chapter in Tohatchi, New Mexico, and is both Navajo and Cherokee.

Henry filled out all the registration forms before the primary election, but she said that when she went to the local fire station to vote early, workers couldn’t find her in the system.

She plans to try and vote again in November. Henry said voting is about providing a better future for her daughter.

“I just I want equal rights for her,” she said. “I just want everything to be OK for her and for her not to be judged or to be looked down on.”

“Being minorities and Native American, it’s really hard to make something of yourself, and I don’t want things to be harder for her.”

Come back Aug. 20 to see the full News21 report on “Voting Wars.”

Kansas voters face bureaucratic hurdle with birth certificates

2016-08-22T18:10:14Z

WICHITA, Kan. – Advocates for gender equality say the proof of citizenship requirement to vote in Kansas can create additional barriers for women and transgender voters.

The National Organization for Women released a statement June 23 claiming women are still fighting for voting rights because of how voter identification laws can negatively affect them. The statement cites a Brennan Center report that indicated one-third of eligible women voters only has access to proof of citizenship that does not match their current name.

In 2011, Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach implemented the Secure and Fair Elections Act, which requires registrants to show both a photo ID and proof of citizenship. Proof of citizenship documents include a passport or birth certificate, and plaintiffs have challenged this provision in court.

Since many women and transgender voters legally change their names as adults, their current photo ID may not match their birth certificate.

For example, workers asked Sedgwick County resident Barbara Moore to produce her marriage and divorce papers when she registered to vote at her local Department of Motor Vehicles in Sedgwick County, Kansas, then again at the county election office when her registration didn’t go through. She said her name on her birth certificate did not match her current identification.

“I’m just lucky I’m halfway organized with all that stuff,” Moore told News21. She said the easiest thing would be to just not change your name at all when you get married.

Kobach said the new requirements aren’t a burden, and women do not need to produce a paper trail to vote.

“Kansas law is very clear: All you have to do is sign a piece of paper when you register or when you present the documents,” Kobach said.

The act states that if “evidence of citizenship is deemed unsatisfactory” because an inconsistency of name or gender, the applicant can sign an affidavit.

However, affidavits are almost impossible to find online, said Thomas Witt, executive director for Equality Kansas, a coalition that fights to end discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

News21 found the document through the specific URL, but it is not on the Secretary of State’s website. The affidavits also are exploitive of one’s gender identification, he said, which shouldn’t have to do with voting.

The proof of citizenship requirement concerns Witt because transgender voters cannot change the gender marker on their birth certificate through the Kansas Department of Health and Environment. This could cause problems with election workers if the photo ID and proof of citizenship requirements do not match.

“You shouldn’t have to out yourself to vote,” Witt told News21.

In 2012, Witt said he started hearing about problems, and he wanted an immediate amendment to the birth certificate provision of the state’s voter ID law.

Equality Kansas, Witt’s organization, is a plaintiff in Belenky v. Kobach, a case that accuses Kobach of creating a two-tier voting system. This means those who register with the federal form without the proof of citizenship requirement can’t vote in state and local elections.

They will have to vote with a provisional ballot, and officials will only count their votes for federal elections. On July 29, State Judge Larry Hendricks issued a temporary injunction to require officials to count all votes cast in the Aug. 2 primary, regardless of proof of citizenship.

Hendricks will have a hearing Sept. 12 to decide what will happen in the November presidential election.

Come back Aug. 20 to see the full News21 report on “Voting Wars.”

Youth get-out-the-vote efforts creates ‘outlet’ on South Dakota reservation

2016-08-18T17:10:02Z

The memorial at the former site of the Tekakwitha Orphanage on the Lake Traverse Reservation near Sisseton, South Dakota. Children from nearby communities were taken from their families and brought to the orphanage for decades. (Photo by Mike Lakusiak/News21)

AGENCY VILLAGE, S.D. – Dustina Gill approaches young people roaming around the Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate Wacipi – commonly referred to as a powwow.

Clipboard in hand, Gill asks them whether they’re 18 and if they have registered to vote.

She’s part of a voter registration effort targeting potential voters in South Dakota. Gill and some other volunteers hit the Wacipi, which takes place each Fourth of July weekend outside of Agency Village on the Lake Traverse Reservation. The grounds sit eight miles south of Sisseton.

Dustina Gill (Photo by Mike Lakusiak/News21)

Gill has worked for nonprofits and youth programming on the reservation for years. She said she relies heavily on young people from the community for her voter registration and get-out-the-vote efforts.

“The youth I work with are the kids who aren’t straight-A students,” she said. “They’re the kids who miss school, the kids who’ve been to treatment, those kids that are never eligible for leadership opportunities because of the criteria.”

She said while the issues facing Native American youth on reservations have drawn national attention, young people still fall through the cracks.

“One of the things some of those kids really liked is getting out the vote and registering people,” she said. She described how they gathered across from polling places with signs reading “honk if you voted” on Election Day.

“It was their outlet,” she said. “During election year, they were straight, knocking on doors. I’m like, ‘I’ve tapped into something.’”

“It makes them feel involved in the process. … If I can make these kids growing up feel they’re part of some part of good history, imagine what they could be as adults.”

While taking a break at the Wacipi, she highlights the importance of voting and building more of that “good history” – especially given some of the atrocities Native Americans have faced.

She mentions a park the tribe recently built along the road from Sisseton. The park is the former site of the church-run Tekakwitha Orphanage, which operated between 1931 and 1986.

“They stole children,” Gill said. She described how the children housed there were not actually orphans, but they were taken from their families and traditions in an effort to assimilate them into American society.

There were many allegations of physical and sexual abuse at Tekakwitha, some of which were the subject of a lawsuit against the local Catholic diocese in 2010.

Gill’s grandmother was taken from her family at a young age and sent to Tekakwitha.

“She waited until it got dark, and she ran back,” Gill said. “Imagine a 4-year-old running for miles. She made it back home. They came the next day and took her again. Four times she did that.”

“Anytime in my life when I thought it was hard, I always thought of that little 4-year-old running in the dark.”

“If my grandma can do that so we’re here, I can survive whatever it is I’m going through. And there’s a lot of families that think like that.”

Come back Aug. 20 to see the full News21 report on “Voting Wars.”

Pine Ridge reservation youth counselor: ‘I can’t wait until they’re 18’

2016-08-18T16:43:40Z

Youth counselor on Pine Ridge reservation stresses importance of voting from News21 on Vimeo.

PINE RIDGE, S.D. – Yvonne “Tiny” DeCory was out until 3 a.m. on a rainy morning in July counseling a young woman.

“I had a girl last night, she cut her arms pretty good,” DeCory said. “She just didn’t want to live.”

DeCory runs a youth support organization in the heart of the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota.

“My everyday is keeping kids alive,” she said. “I tell them, ‘Your struggle is real, but we can deal with it.’”

The village of Pine Ridge is quiet, the roads muddy, and most of the activity takes place around the gas station at the town’s main intersection and the health center.

Youth outreach worker Yvonne “Tiny” DeCory stands in the “Bear Cave” – a youth center in Pine Ridge Village, South Dakota.

“Look around here, there’s a lot of poverty. And now we’re back at No. 1,” DeCory said, referring to the latest poverty rankings. “I’m not proud about that.” Oglala Lakota County, which makes up most of the reservation, was the poorest county in the country, according to the most recent U.S. Census Bureau data.

The poverty level is just one of the factors connected to the reservation’s high number of youth suicides, according to experts.

The crisis here has been written about for years, and DeCory said journalists routinely contact her about visiting the reservation.

But she said there’s no point in drawing more attention to the issue from outsiders who parachute in to report on tragedy. Today, she wants to talk about voting.

“It’s tough living here for these kids, and they see that,” she said. “But there’s hope. There’s really a lot of good here.”

DeCory views voting as important and empowering for Native American youth. Turning 18 and being able to cast a ballot is a major milestone for them.

“I can’t wait until they’re 18,” she said. “We want them to get out there.”

“If everybody gets out there to vote, we can be the deciding factor,” DeCory said. She explained that the population of Pine Ridge is young and convincing young people of the importance of voting is sorely needed.

“I want you to register, and I want you to exercise your vote. No one can take that away from you.”

Come back Aug. 20 to see the full News21 report on “Voting Wars.”

Critics blast Kansas’ online voter registration system, one candidate seeks investigation

2016-08-17T20:47:59Z

The Kansas Capitol in Topeka. (Sarah Pitts/News21)

WICHITA, Kan. – An official with the Kansas Democratic Party is urging voters not to register online, saying the system has not properly processed residents’ registrations.

Cheyenne Davis, the field and political director for the Kansas Democratic Party, said many voters have found it faulty and often call her to express their anger with the system.

Carri New, a Wichitan who has run voter registration drives through her involvement with the Bernie Sanders campaign, also said she’s witnessed problems. She cited one drive in which dozens of voters signed up but later found that they were not actually registered.

“There were a lot of Sundays spent in coffee shops registering voters,” New said. “So, we were doing it online. Well, come to find out all of those online applications went nowhere.”

Kansas began accepting online applications in 2008.

The system’s critics blame Secretary of State Kris Kobach, who also faces legal challenges over his methods of election security, though he did not enter office until 2011.

Kobach implemented the Secure and Fair Elections Act, which requires registrants to show both a photo ID and proof of citizenship. Proof of citizenship documents include a passport or birth certificate, and plaintiffs have challenged this provision in court.

Kobach told News21 that his election philosophy is that it should be easy to vote and hard to cheat. He said the online system in Kansas is an addition to the National Voter Registration Act of 1993, which aims to make voting easy and accessible.

“Kansas is one of the first states that allowed people to register to vote on the Internet,” Kobach told News21. “Now it’s pretty common. I think slightly more than half of the states have that.”

On July 27, Steven Davis, a Democrat from Lawrence, Kansas, who is running for a seat in the state House of Representatives, petitioned for a grand jury investigation into Kobach’s handling of electronically submitted proof of citizenship documents.

“The concern has been that people who register with that online system get their information sort of lost in the ether and don’t end up on the registration books,” he told News21.

As of Aug. 4, Davis’ petition had enough signatures to allow the grand jury to investigate, according to the Associated Press.

Come back Aug. 20 to see the full News21 report on “Voting Wars.”