Comprehensive bill on elections advances from House committee
Cutline: Rep. DJ Johnson, R-Owensboro, explains his comprehensive elections bill, House Bill 534, during Thursday’s House Elections, Constitutional Amendments and Intergovernmental Affairs Committee meeting. A high-res version is available here.
FRANKFORT — The House Elections, Constitutional Amendments and Intergovernmental Affairs Committee approved a bill on Thursday that seeks to prevent felons and non-citizens from voting in Kentucky, among other provisions.
Rep. DJ Johnson, R-Owensboro, is the chair of the committee and the sponsor of House Bill 534. He said the state Secretary of State’s office, the Kentucky Board of Elections, the Kentucky County Clerk’s Association, and others have been involved in the process of drafting the legislation.
Under HB 534, the state Administrative Office of the Courts would send the State Board of Elections a list of every person in Kentucky convicted of a felony by July 1. The board would have until Aug. 1 to remove any person on the list who is registered to vote from the voting registration records.
Another key provision of HB 534 would authorize the board of elections to enter into agreements with federal agencies to identify individuals who are registered to vote but are not American citizens.
Those identified as non-citizens would be notified that they cannot cast another vote in Kentucky without providing proof of citizenship. The bill would create a process for individuals identified as non-citizens to cast a provisional ballot until citizenship status is verified, Johnson said.
The legislation would also allow the state to share certain voter information with federal agencies, including the name, date of birth and social security number of registered voters.
HB 534 would also change who can appoint members to the Kentucky Registry of Election Finance to include the Kentucky Senate President and Speaker of the House of Representatives.
The bill would also allow county clerks to make images of scanned cast ballots publicly available electronically as long as the images do not include any voter-identifying information.
Danetta Ford Allen, president of the Kentucky County Clerk’s Association, told the committee the association has many concerns with HB 534, but she only shared three.
“First, while county clerks appreciate the intent behind allowing Kentucky to use the federal citizenship information available through the SAVE Act, we do feel that it will put eligible Kentucky voters at risk of becoming ineligible and incorrectly removed from the voter rolls,” Allen said.
Additionally, Allen said county clerks worry the emergency clause in the bill would disrupt the May 19 primary election. The organization also has concerns about making cast ballots electronically available.
Johnson said the technology that would make the ballots available electronically is emerging, and that section of the bill is intended to be proactive.
Rep. Josh Branscum, R-Russell Springs, asked if it would be better to “hit pause” on that part of the legislation for now.
Johnson said he was open to a floor amendment to address that concern and to delay the implementation until after the May 19 primary election.
Rep. Mary Lou Marzian, D-Louisville, said she knows Kentucky has one of the safest election processes in the country with a fraud rate of less than zero. She asked Johnson if he’s found any voting irregularities or fraud in Kentucky.
Johnson said he’s aware of at least once incident where a couple of ballots were illegally cast in his own election, but he agrees Kentucky has safe elections.
“That does not mean we can’t continue to improve it though,” he added.
HB 534 will now go before the full House after a 9-2 vote with one pass vote.
Rep. Erika Hancock, D-Frankfort, who spoke on financial concerns she had with the bill earlier in the meeting, voted “no” on the bill.
“This bill creates sweeping election changes without documented need, fiscal transparency or adequate voter protections in the current form,” she said.
While a few other committee members said they have a few concerns with the legislation, most voted “yes” and said they trust Johnson to make the appropriate changes. Rep. Ryan Bivens, R-Hodgenville, was one of them.
“Obviously we don’t want to do anything that’s going to be cumbersome to our county clerks out there, so I would love to see you clean this up before we get to the House floor,” he said. “… But I do think the intent behind this is very good.”