{"id":1447,"date":"2012-03-20T10:55:45","date_gmt":"2012-03-20T14:55:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/?p=1447"},"modified":"2012-03-20T10:55:45","modified_gmt":"2012-03-20T14:55:45","slug":"republican-rep-walsh-proposes-federal-proof-of-citizenship-to-vote-law-that-could-disenfranchise-15-million-americans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/2012\/03\/republican-rep-walsh-proposes-federal-proof-of-citizenship-to-vote-law-that-could-disenfranchise-15-million-americans\/","title":{"rendered":"Republican Rep. Walsh Proposes Federal &#8216;Proof Of Citizenship To Vote&#8217; Law That Could Disenfranchise 15 Million Americans"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A Republican congressman from Illinois praised a controversial new voting measure at a town hall last month, calling for a national version of the law that could disenfranchise millions.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL), who grabbed headlines for owing his ex-wife over $100,000 in child support and defending big banks against irate constituents<\/strong>, lauded the recent move by some states (Alabama, Kansas, and Tennessee) to require that voters present proof of citizenship before they are given a ballot. The Brennan Center for Justice estimates that seven percent of Alabama\u2019s citizens \u2014 240,000 people \u2014 do not possess proof of citizenship, such as a passport or a birth certificate, and could be disenfranchised.<\/p>\n<p>But Walsh wasn\u2019t content with just three states employing such laws. \u201cI don\u2019t know why we don\u2019t mandate at the federal level that you have to show proof of citizenship to vote,\u201d declared the Illinois freshman at a town hall in Palatine on February 25.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/yj0HpaSXOuE?feature=player_embedded\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"340\" height=\"260\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>READ MORE:<\/p>\n<p>via <a href=\"http:\/\/thinkprogress.org\/justice\/2012\/03\/20\/447039\/joe-walsh-federal-proof-of-citizenship\/\">Rep. Walsh Proposes Federal &#8216;Proof Of Citizenship To Vote&#8217; Law That Could Disenfranchise 15 Million Americans | ThinkProgress<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Republican congressman from Illinois praised a controversial new voting measure at a town hall last month, calling for a national version of the law that could disenfranchise millions. Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL), who grabbed headlines for owing his ex-wife over $100,000 in child support and defending big banks against irate constituents, lauded the recent&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[19,5,22],"tags":[947,557,948,343],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1447"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1447"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1447\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1448,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1447\/revisions\/1448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1447"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1447"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}