Manipulating where students vote won't work | Opinion

[Geee]

Cincinnati.com

Some journalists are disingenuously claiming that Ohio’s new election integrity law will suppress the votes of out-of-state students. But the left is far more concerned about manipulating exactly where students turn out to vote than defending their basic right to do so.

Ohio’s new law already provides fair and consistent opportunities for college students to exercise their right to vote through its popular voter ID provisions. Ohio voters are required to show a government-issued photo ID when they show up to the polls, available to all Ohio residents, free of charge.

Under Ohio’s new law, out-of-state college students have two voting methods at their disposal: They can vote by mail in their hometown election or register and vote in their college town. Ohio’s new law makes that easy enough. College students just need to switch their residency and obtain an Ohio driver’s license or a free state ID to show at the polls.

 

But many out-of-state students understandably don’t want to switch their residency. Some claim out-of-state status for financial aid or other reasons, while others intend to return to their home states after graduation. They can still vote, just not where liberals want them to: on their college campuses.

Why is campus voting so important to the left? Party operatives want to leverage high concentrations of young, likely liberal students to elect Democratic Party candidates. Colleges can pull in tens of thousands of potential votes from other states and communities, enough to swing key local, state and federal races.