Gov. Kathy Hochul and her political allies have made great efforts to convince New Yorkers they are motivated by improving our democratic processes, but actions speak louder than words. The push to widely expand mail-in voting runs contrary to what voters expressed in a statewide referendum in 2021, yet New York State is prepared to […]
Gov. Kathy Hochul and her political allies have made great efforts to convince New Yorkers they are motivated by improving our democratic processes, but actions speak louder than words. The push to widely expand mail-in voting runs contrary to what voters expressed in a statewide referendum in 2021, yet New York State is prepared to implement it anyway.
The move, while portrayed as a way to “protect democracy” and increase voter participation, is motivated entirely by political considerations. Access to absentee ballots already exists. In-person voting is an important part of our democracy, and it represents the best way to combat voter fraud and other electoral foul play. We know this to be the case, and voters in New York made that clear by overwhelmingly rejecting mail-in ballot expansion when it came up just two years ago.
In our system of government, the voice of the people takes priority above all else. Our electoral process is built on the principle that what happens at the ballot box determines the course of action. On mail-in ballots, the results of the 2021 election were deliberately overturned, and New Yorkers should be very concerned.
Luckily, Democrats’ bold-faced rejection of our most fundamental democratic principles will likely be blocked in court. It is clear that in order to actually expand mail-in voting a constitutional amendment is needed; that is the reason it appeared on the ballot in the first place. Now, time, energy and resources are going to need to be wasted to restore election procedures that never should have been tampered with in the first place.
These changes represent a troubling pattern where New York’s election laws are being turned upside-down. In addition to the expansion of absentee voting, recent laws to move local elections to even-numbered years and dictate where constitutional challenges to election outcomes can occur have also been pushed onto an unwilling electorate. These measures will undoubtedly drown out local issues and favorably impact the governor and her allies, and one can only wonder if they would even be on the agenda if not for their political value.
The motivation behind these changes is obvious: preservation of New York’s one-party rule. Forcing through a law that was summarily rejected at the ballot box is bad enough. Claiming to be doing so in the name of democracy is a level of disingenuous political rhetoric we haven’t seen in quite some time.
William (Will) A. Barclay, 54, Republican, is the New York Assembly minority leader and represents the 120th New York Assembly District, which encompasses all of Oswego County, as well as parts of Jefferson and Cayuga counties.
