After four months of intense criticism over a universal ban on non-partisan voter registration drives at federal veterans facilities, the Department of Veterans Affairs yesterday announced it will allow such drives provided they don't interfere with day-to-day operations. In a brief press release the VA outlined conditions promoting voter registration within its facilities:
The policy requires that information about the right of VA patients to register and vote, and other patients’ rights, be posted in every VA hospital, and that all VA patients be provided a copy of these rights when they are admitted to a VA facility.
Every hospital is now also required to publish a written policy on voter assistance, allowing patients to leave the hospital to register and vote, subject to the opinions of their health care providers. Patients unable to leave the facility must be assisted to register and to vote by absentee ballot.
It was in early May when the VA issued its controversial directive banning groups from conducting voter registration drives on VA property. The department referenced its adherence to the Hatch Act, which regulates a federal employee's political activity--even though, as the New York Times then pointed out, veterans are not federal employees. Furthermore, a VA spokesman told the Times:
"[The VA] wanted to ensure that our staff remains focused on caring for our
veterans instead of having to determine the political agenda of each
group that might try to enter our facilities.”
Among politicians who came out against this May directive were U.S. Senators John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who were already exchanging letters with VA Secretary James B. Peake over the issue. In a letter from the senators dated May 6, they expressed frustration with an apparent reversal of VA voting policies issued just days before:
On April 25, 2008, the Department of Veterans Affairs responded to
our request for a consistent voter registration policy by issuing
Directive 2008-23. While we do not believe it went far enough, we
commend the changes made by the Directive which provided that veterans
would be required to receive voter information and assistance in
registering and applying for an absentee ballot...However,
in the few days following the issuance of the first directive, the
Department apparently withdrew it. Without explaining the rationale for
this change, the Department today released a new policy, Directive
2008-25...it appears that a new and broad prohibition
was included against third-party organizations conducting voter
registration drives.
Last month Susan Bysiewicz, Connecticut's secretary of state, penned an op-ed in the New York Times recalling her own experiences trying to register veterans to vote:
On June 30, I visited the Veterans Affairs Hospital in West Haven,
Conn., to distribute information on the state’s new voting machines and
to register veterans to vote. I was not allowed inside the hospital.
Outside
on the sidewalk, I met Martin O’Nieal, a 92-year-old man who lost a leg
while fighting the Nazis in the mountains of Northern Italy during the
harsh winter of 1944. Mr. O’Nieal has been a resident of the hospital
since 2007. He wanted to vote last year, but he told me that there was
no information about how to register to vote at the hospital and the
nurses could not answer his questions about how or where to cast a
ballot.
Now with yesterday's new VA directive, it remains to be seen whether the flurry of criticism will end as veterans like Mr. O'Nieal start to register with more ease -- or, if in reality, all of this is coming too late. With less than two months until the presidential election, some
critics wonder if there is enough time to register a significant number
of veterans. In an interview with the New York Times, Paul Sullivan,
the executive director of
Veterans for Common Sense, gave his view of the situation:
“The real question now is whether the V.A. will implement the new
policy in time for the November election and whether local and state
voting officials will take proactive steps to sign up the veterans at
these facilities.”
Though it's unlikely that even a modest surge in the number of veterans registered to vote would influence the presidential election, it's still interesting to note where most veterans seem to stand politically. In late August Gallup released information showing veterans favor McCain over Obama 56 to 34-percent. The statistics came at a time when overall U.S. voters were favoring Obama over McCain 46 to 43-percent. Gallup also looked to see whether veterans were favoring McCain because he is a veteran himself, or whether they favor him out of a greater affinity for the Republican platform. According to the pollsters:
McCain clearly holds an advantage over Obama among veterans, but that
is probably due more to the fact that veterans tend to be Republicans
than to the fact that McCain himself served in the military and is
regarded by some as a war hero. Veterans showed similarly strong
support for Bush in the 2004 presidential election. The data suggest
there still is an effect of military service on candidate preference,
but it is rather small and is overwhelmed by the effects of party
affiliation.
