ACLU Files Lawsuit To Overturn Pa. Voter ID Law

By Cherri Gregg

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - The American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania announced that it is filing a lawsuit today in an effort to overturn the state's new voter ID law.

The lawsuit names the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Governor Tom Corbett, and Secretary of Commonwealth Carol Aichele.

The ACLU says its goal is to stop the law before it goes into effect in November (see previous story).

"It's one of the most draconian of such laws passed within the United States," says NAACP Philadelphia branch president Jerry Mondesire, whose organization joined the ACLU lawsuit.

He says time is of the essence, because if the law is not overturned thousands of Pennsylvania voters could be disenfranchised (see related story).

"There are 110 colleges in this commonwealth. Ninety-three of them do not have an expiration on the student IDs," a requirement for acceptable forms of identification at polling places.

Mondesire says there are other vulnerable voter populations, such as older Pennsylvanians born in the South who don't have birth certificates, or individuals recently released from prison.

He says the law was passed for the sole purpose of suppressing votes.

"There has never been a case of voter identity fraud ever identified by this administration. And when they were asked to identify one such case in the last five years, the secretary of state, appointed by Governor Corbett, said there were none."

Details of the lawsuit were to be released at a news conference in Harrisburg later in the day (see related story).