The photo ID cards to be issued by the Department of Elections have no expiration date. The Photo identification law does not require that the photo identification have an expiration date. Therefore, logically, expiration of a document should not be the criteria used to disenfranchise a voter if the photograph reasonably resembles the bearer.

There is nothing in the law or Virginia practice that prohibits the use of expired IDs.  The SBE was on sound ground when adopted the regulations to do so.  If there was a legal impediment to using expired IDs, the proposed regulations could not stand either, since they still allow expired IDs.  The only change is that they have selected an arbitrary period of 30 days.  There is no legal justification for such a change and, on policy grounds, it clearly goes against the SBE’s mission of helping people to vote.

The SBE should reject these proposed revisions and stand by its original definition of valid to include expired passports, driver’s licenses and other documents that reasonably identify the bearer of the document as the person whose photograph appears on it.

If the name and the photo match the voter, why is the expiration date of an I.D. even a matter of concern unless the purpose is to make voting harder for vulnerable populations.

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Thank you! Martha Fowler