CLOSE
Vote (Photo: Getty images/iStockphoto)
The American Civil Liberties Union of Montana and Native American Rights Fund filed a lawsuit on Thursday, challenging a state law that they allege restricts Native Americans’ voting rights.
Western Native Voice v. Stapleton, filed in the Montana 13th District Court in Yellowstone County, challenges the Montana Ballot Interference Prevention Act (BIPA), which limits who can collect and convey a ballot belonging to another person.
Montana Secretary of State Corey Stapleton oversees elections and is responsible for all outreach and education pertaining to BIPA, according to the official state website.
"(BIPA) is supported overwhelmingly by Montanans, including the counties in Indian Country," said Stapleton. "It's always dicey when plaintiffs try to overturn the will of the people."
Jeff Mangan, the commissioner of political practices and Attorney General Tim Fox are named as defendants as well. Mangan told the Associated Press he was still reviewing the lawsuit.
State Sen. Albert Olszewski, R-Kalispell, who is now running for governor, introduced BIPA in 2017, which passed in Legislative Referendum in 2018.
The lawsuit was brought on behalf of voting organizations Western Native Voice and Montana Native Vote and the Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes of Fort Peck, Blackfeet Nation, Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Reservation, Crow Tribe, and Fort Belknap Indian Community.
More: State-Tribal Relations Committee takes up treaty rights, voting barriers, land status in Billings meetings
"We are urging the court to immediately block this law that would disenfranchise thousands of eligible voters who live on rural reservations,” Alora Thomas-Lundborg, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project, said in a news release. “This case is about making sure every eligible voter who wants to vote can actually do so.”
Montana Secretary of State Corey Stapleton is responsible for all outreach and education pertaining to BIPA. (Photo: Secretary of State Corey Stapleton)
Because they are geographically isolated and have limited access to postal service and transportation, rural tribal communities work with voting organizations to collect and transport ballots to election offices that would otherwise be inaccessible, the plaintiffs said. For many Indigenous people, these collection efforts are often the only way they can vote.
Vote organizers previously collected about 85 ballots each, but with BIPA restrictions, they would be limited to six ballots per collector, according to the plaintiffs' news release. BIPA supporters in the Legislature said these restrictions would reduce the risk of voters giving their ballots to strangers who could change them or throw them away, according to the Associated Press.
BIPA also institutes a fine of up to $500 for bringing ballots to the post office on behalf of relatives or neighbors, according to the news release. BIPA defines a “family member” as “an individual who is related to the voter by blood, marriage, adoption or legal guardianship,” but that definition is incompatible with Indigenous family structures, which include extended family and community members, the plaintiffs said.
“BIPA ignores the everyday realities that face Native American communities. It is not reasonable to expect voters to drive an hour to drop off their ballot, so collecting ballots in reservation communities just makes sense. Criminalizing this behavior is unfair to Native American voters and does nothing to solve the real problem of mail not being picked up and delivered to Native homes,” said Jacqueline De León of the Native American Rights Fund.
"For Native voters living on a reservation, this law directly harms our ability to participate in our democracy,” Marci McLean, executive director of Western Native Voice, said in the news release.
McLean also spoke about Native American voting barriers at a State-Tribal Relations Committee (STRC) meeting in Billings in November. In addition to BIPA, McLean identified other challenges, including: far distances to polling locations coupled with a lack of access to vehicles, lack of physical addresses, mail delivery issues (Indigenous people often use P.O. boxes instead of mailboxes and have unequal access to post offices), P.O. boxes are limited to just one family per residence (in Native communities, multiple families often share one residence) and language barriers (English is the second language for some Indigenous people).
McLean offered a number of potential solutions, including: increasing access to post offices as well as longer post office hours, implementing same-day voter registration at all polling locations and removing the requirement of a stamp to return absentee ballots.
Last week, members of the STRC heard from representatives from the Rural Utah Project, an organization that assists with voter registration for members of the Navajo Nation, about a possible solution to the lack of physical addresses, which prevent some Native Americans from registering to vote.
Similar to street addresses for people who don't have them, plus codes are shortened longitude and latitude coordinates. Plus codes are free, and everyone already has one (accessible through Google Maps). In addition to enabling people to register to vote, plus codes allow people everywhere receive deliveries and access emergency medical services.
This article contains information from The Associated Press.
Nora Mabie covers Indigenous communities for the Great Falls Tribune. She can be reached at nmabie@greatfallstribune.com. Follow her on Facebook @NoraMabieJournalist or on Twitter @NoraMabie.
To support her work, subscribe today and get a special offer.
Read or Share this story: https://www.greatfallstribune.com/story/news/2020/03/12/western-native-voice-v-stapleton-bipa-voting-rights-native-americans-montana/5031490002/
Na quinta-feira, a  de Montana e o Fundo de Direitos dos Nativos Americanos entraram com uma ação contra o estado de Montana por causa da Lei de Prevenção de Interferência do Voto (BIPA) de 2018, dizendo que impediria muitos nativos americanos de votar.

Segundo relatos, a maioria dos residentes de Montana vota pelo correio, incluindo 73% dos votos nas . Como o  não cobre a maioria das reservas dos , muitas das pessoas que moram lá preenchem suas cédulas e entregam a organizações que as destinam aos locais de votação. A reclamação observa que muitos residentes das reservas de Montana não têm acesso a transporte confiável para levarem seus votos.

De acordo com a lei anterior, cada operadora estava limitada a 80 das cédulas de outras pessoas, a menos que fizessem parte da família do eleitor. Com o BIPA, esse número cai para seis. A multa por violar essa lei foi fixada em  500.

Jacqueline De León, do Fundo de Direitos dos Nativos Americanos, disse: "O BIPA ignora as realidades cotidianas que as comunidades nativas americanas enfrentam. Não é razoável esperar que os eleitores levem uma hora para desistir de sua votação, portanto, coletar cédulas em comunidades de reserva faz sentido. Criminalizar esse comportamento é injusto para com os eleitores nativos americanos e não faz nada para resolver o problema real das correspondências não serem recolhidas nos lares".

Os legisladores estaduais que apóiam a lei argumentaram que era para evitar fraudes eleitorais, especificamente para impedir que as pessoas coletassem votos e depois as jogassem fora se não gostassem das decisões dos eleitores. O secretário de estado de , Corey Stapleton, disse que o BIPA "é apoiado predominantemente por montanenses. ... É sempre arriscado quando os queixosos tentam derrubar a vontade do povo".

Em 2020, Montana tinha sete reservas de nativos americanos, com cerca de 70 mil pessoas vivendo nelas. Segundo o censo demográfico, a população total do estado em 2020 era estimada em pouco mais de um milhão.

O processo foi aberto no . Uma questão levantada pela denúncia foi a definição do BIPA do termo "". Muitas das culturas ameríndias de Montana, segundo a denúncia, têm um conceito de família que não corresponde à idéia de família tradicional difundida na .