Pre-Marked Voter Registration Cards in California

Somebody dropped the ball. Or maybe it was deliberate.

10News in California reports that a couple received a voter registration card from Covered California, their health insurance provider, with an “x” in the box next to the Democratic party.

[The couple] have lived in La Mesa for years and they have always been registered to vote Republican. Now, they are perplexed as to how the voter registration card pre-marked Democrat ended up in their mailbox.
…
Covered California began mailing out voter signup cards to nearly 4 million enrollees last week after being threatened with a lawsuit by voting rights groups. But that does not explain the pre-filled out voter registration card.

Full stop. A threatened lawsuit for not sending health insurance sign-ups voter registration cards? The National Voter Registration Act of 1993 requires state governments to allow qualified voters to register at the DMV or when applying for social services.

Covered California’s Anne Gonzales told the news station that the health insurer is “mailing voter registration material” but the application forms come from Secretary of State’s office “with no fields pre-marked.”

I suspect if a Democrat-voting couple had received a voter registration card pre-marked “Republican” party, this would have been a story of global proportions.

Photo credit: Kenn Wilson (Creative Commons)