LANSING – Voting will be more convenient, but more secure under changes proposed Wednesday in Governor Rick Snyder’s State of the State Address, Secretary of State Ruth Johnson said afterward.
A particular focus for Johnson was the expansion of no-reason absentee voting. Under the plan, voters could go in person to their local clerk’s office up to 45 days before the election and, showing picture identification, receive a ballot. They could vote the ballot then or take it home and mail it in, she said.
“You’re cutting out half to three-quarters of the process,” she said of the current absentee ballot system, which requires voters to mail in a request, the clerk to mail the ballot, and the voter to mail it back.
The change could also save some postage for local governments, she said.
But it could also increase traffic in clerks’ offices. She expected the new system to expand the number of absentee voters from the current 25 percent average.
The clerks were ready, though, the Michigan Townships Association said. “Broader use of absentee ballots has helped alleviate routine standing in long lines at the polls,” Larry Merrill, MTA executive director, said. “Absentee ballots recognize the reality of 21st century lifestyles – voters’ workday schedules are less predictable, and there are more time commitments on people today. The process needs to be as user friendly as possible to ensure greater participation in the electoral process.”
Those voters currently allowed to vote absentee with no reason by mail could continue to do so, she said.
“I just want to make it convenient and secure for everybody,” she said.
Security would come from maintaining the identification requirement used at the polls, and from still counting the ballots on election day under the supervision of poll watchers, she said.
The plan to allow online voter registration is done under the same theme of convenient and secure. “We want everybody to have as many ways to register as possible,” she said.
The program, she said, would essentially connect the system the department uses now in its branch offices to the Internet, accepting the same verification of residency to prove eligibility to vote.
Johnson said one hoped outcome of the new system would be a reduction in complaints against third-party voter registration programs.
While outside groups would still be permitted to solicit residents to register to vote, but she said the majority of complaints against those groups is they lose the registration form. “They would be able to register online,” she said of the complainants.
Snyder’s plan also called for campaign finance changes. Johnson said she supported the proposal to require quarterly filings by all candidates. “Somebody could donate $3,400 to a candidate and you might not know for almost a year,” she said of the current system. The amount is the maximum individual contribution to a statewide candidate.
Snyder also called for modernizing the state’s campaign contribution limits. Currently, the maximum donation for an election cycle from an individual to a House candidate is $500. The limit is $1,000 for a Senate candidate. The limit for statewide candidates is $3,400. Political action committees can donate up to $5,000 to a House candidate, $10,000 for a Senate candidate and $34,000 for a statewide candidate.
How much of an increase Snyder will propose is unclear.
A spokesperson for Johnson said the secretary was not involved in Snyder’s proposal to increase contribution limits. Snyder press secretary Sara Wurfel did not say how much of an increase to the limits Snyder envisions, but noted that the levels are the same as they were when first installed in 1976.
If the $500 limit on House candidates were adjusted for inflation, that amount would now equal more than $2,000. The $3,400 limit would be nearly $14,000.
Senate Minority Leader Gretchen Whitmer (D-East Lansing) said Snyder was much more definitive about raising the limits in an afternoon briefing to legislators than he was in the speech. While Snyder’s outline clearly said he wanted to “modernize campaign contribution limits,” he instead said in his speech that the Legislature and he should look at the limits.
“In our briefing, just hours ago, he talked a lot about raising the campaign finance limits,” she said. “It was glossed over here. He said it like it would help transparency, which is hilarious. Give me a break. If you polled the public right now and said ‘is there enough money campaigns right now,’ I’m pretty sure they’d all say ‘yeah.’ They’d probably say too much.”
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