Voter ID Laws
A policy shaped less by the fraud it claims to prevent and more by who it disenfranchises.
The short version
- 36 states require ID to vote; the strictest offer no alternatives if you don't have the right document.
- In-person voter impersonation — the fraud these laws target — accounts for roughly 31 confirmed cases per billion ballots cast.
- An estimated 21 million Americans lack qualifying ID, disproportionately the poor, elderly, and non-white.
- When North Carolina wrote its law, lawmakers requested racial data on ID ownership — then specifically excluded the forms Black voters most commonly held.
What it is
Voter ID laws require citizens to present a specific form of government-issued identification to cast a ballot. As of 2024, 36 U.S. states have some form of voter ID requirement, ranging from strict photo ID (no ID, no vote) to flexible (a signature, affidavit, or alternative verification may substitute). The strictest laws require a narrow list of approved documents and offer no alternative; provisional ballots are available in some states but often go uncounted.
Proponents argue these laws prevent in-person voter fraud — the act of a person casting a ballot under a false name or identity. The underlying assumption is that this form of fraud is real, significant, and worth the cost of a remedy. Opponents argue that this particular fraud is statistically negligible, and that the ID requirements create substantial barriers for eligible citizens who lack the required documents.
The debate over voter ID is inseparable from the demographics of who lacks qualifying ID. Studies consistently find that lower-income voters, elderly voters, young voters, and Black and Latino voters are significantly less likely to possess the forms of ID required — the same populations that face structural obstacles to obtaining them. The costs of acquiring underlying documents (birth certificates, proof of address, time off work to visit a government office) fall disproportionately on people with fewer resources.
Why it matters
The problem voter ID laws are designed to solve is, by measurable evidence, nearly nonexistent. A comprehensive investigation by the News21 journalism project found 2,068 alleged cases of election fraud from 2000 to 2012, across billions of votes cast — and in-person impersonation, the specific conduct ID requirements address, accounted for 10 of those cases. A Washington Post analysis of general elections found 31 credible instances of in-person impersonation out of more than one billion ballots cast.
The costs of the proposed remedy are not negligible. An estimated 11% of American citizens — roughly 21 million people — lack a government-issued photo ID. Obtaining the underlying documents can require fees, travel to government offices that keep limited hours, and time off work that is genuinely costly for hourly workers. For elderly voters who were born in rural areas before birth registration was standardized, even proving citizenship can be structurally difficult.
The political valence of these laws is well-documented. When North Carolina passed a strict voter ID law in 2013, legislators requested and received racial data on which forms of ID were held by which voters — and then specifically excluded the forms most commonly held by Black voters while permitting those primarily held by white voters. A federal appeals court struck the law down in 2016, finding it targeted Black voters 'with almost surgical precision.'
Even laws that appear facially neutral can have structured disparate impact. Texas's law initially accepted concealed-carry gun licenses (predominantly held by white Texans) but not public university student IDs (predominantly held by minority students). The question of 'what counts as valid ID?' is itself a policy choice. The answers to that question have not been neutral — and the evidence suggests they are not meant to be.