Voter suppression? Not really: Data show minority turnout surged in 2018

WaEx:

Democrats like to claim that Republicans use various laws such as voter ID — widely supported and used in nearly every major democracy on earth — to disenfranchise minority voters and steal elections. Two-time failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and failed gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams are among those who actually reject election outcomes based on their theory.

But the data offer no evidence, and strongly suggest that it is not true.

The ongoing charge from Democrats is that voter ID laws, along with efforts to clean up voter rolls and limitations on early voting, have disenfranchised massive voting blocs that would otherwise help Democratic candidates. In order to make the argument seem relevant, they also claim, without evidence that these laws disproportionately affect black Americans specifically. However, as Jason L. Riley notes in the Wall Street Journal, the facts do not support these allegations.

“It just so happens that two weeks ago the Census Bureau released a report on voter turnout in 2018, which climbed 11 percentage points from the last midterm election, in 2014, and surpassed 50% for the first time since 1982,” he writes.

He adds, “Moreover, the increased turnout was largely driven by the same minority voters Democrats claim are being disenfranchised. Black turnout grew around 27%, and Hispanic turnout increased about 50%. An analysis of the census data published by the Pew Research Center found that ‘all major racial and ethnic groups saw historic jumps in voter turnout’ last year.” read more