Rep. Soto Joins House Democrats to Pass the Voting Rights Advancement Act

Statement

Today, Rep. Darren Soto (FL-09) joined House Democrats in passing the Voting Rights Advancement Act (VRAA), legislation that restores voting protections in states with a recent history of discrimination.

Five years after the Supreme Court's Shelby County v. Holder decision that gutted the Voting Rights Act, the VRAA creates a modern-day formula to determine which jurisdictions have had a recent history of voter discrimination. The VRAA addresses a wave of voter ID laws, racial gerrymandering and other voter suppression tactics enacted at the state level.

The VRAA restores preclearance enforcement of jurisdictions that have had repeated voting rights violations within the last 25 years.

"The fight for voting rights is as urgent today as it was over 50 years ago when the VRA was first enacted," said Rep. Soto. "The passage of the Voting Rights Advancement Act is just one step further in our work to prevent discrimination, protect the rights of all voters and restore the promise of voter equality for all Floridians."

The VRAA seeks to restore full protections to the Voting Rights Act of 1965 by reinstating the legislative enforcement arm. Specifically, the bill will take into account the Shelby ruling and update the VRA pre-clearance provision to focus on states with a recent history of discrimination.

There are three ways to become a covered jurisdiction:

States with a history of 15 or more violation at any level in the previous 25 years;
States with a history of 10 or more violation, if one violation occurs at the state level in the previous 25 years;
Subdivisions with 3 or more violations in the subdivision in the previous 25 years.
Should the VRAA become law, 11 current states are expected to require the Justice Department to pre-clear changes to state voting laws: Alabama, California, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia.

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