To the editor: While I have no trouble showing my Real ID to vote, I object to the proof of citizenship requirement because it will prevent many women from obtaining their information in time to vote (“Voter ID appears headed for California’s November ballot. What you should know,” March 2).
I found it difficult to obtain a Real ID. While I had my birth certificate, I did not have a copy of my marriage certificate proving the change in my last name. I was divorced and, like many divorced women, threw out my marriage certificate.
After I was told I needed that, it took months to figure out where the marriage certificate was issued and to write to obtain a copy. I was 18 when I was married and the certificate was not issued in the town where we lived, but in another small town. It was a good thing I kept the divorce certificate, because it had the name of the small town on it, but it still took more than a month to obtain a copy.
God help the women who have been married several times. They may find it incredibly difficult to vote. But that is OK with this Republican Congress because they know women vote more than men and have, in increasing numbers, shifted leftward.
This is not about voter fraud, as President Trump claims. It is all about keeping people who will not vote for his puppets in Congress away from the polls.
Shirley Conley, Gardena
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To the editor: The California voter identification initiative that will appear on November’s ballot purports to cure voter fraud that largely does not exist. Many studies show that fraudulent votes happen at a one-in-a-million rate — a risk lower than someone being struck by lightning.
The initiative’s real purpose is to disenfranchise many legitimate voters who can’t overcome the artificial obstacles it imposes. Many affected are married women who have changed their names, people who have changed addresses and those who lack easy access to birth certificates.
I’m a physician. Our Hippocratic Oath enjoins, “Do no harm.” There is nothing to gain in treating imaginary illnesses and great risks of causing dangerous unintended consequences. Our election system is a very healthy patient that needs no partisan jiggering.
This ballot measure will endanger election integrity, not improve it. And it would waste taxpayer dollars that are much better spent serving the real needs of Californians.
Donna Manning, Carmel-by-the-Sea
