The North Carolina NAACP has decried an election ad by N.C. Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger (R), saying it could mislead viewers on the status of the state’s voter ID requirement.
The civil rights organization filed a complaint Sept. 15 with the state Board of Elections and the Guilford County, N.C. district attorney against Berger’s campaign, saying the ad intends to intimidate voters without IDs.
The 30-second spot, which began airing a year ago online and on television, references the encompassing election law passed last year by the Republican-controlled legislature and signed into law by Gov. Pat McCrory (R), which will require voters to show a photo ID, among other changes.
“You need a photo ID to drive, cash a check, even to buy medicine. Shouldn’t you show a photo ID to vote?” the narrator says in the ad. “Liberals like Obama and Kay Hagan say no. Phil Berger fought the liberals and won. Now, thanks to Phil Berger, voters must show a valid photo ID to vote.”
The ad fails to mention, however, that the voter ID requirement doesn’t take effect until 2016.
“It’s not liberal. It’s not conservative. It’s a lie,” the Rev. Dr. William Barber, president of the North Carolina NAACP, said during a Sept. 16 press conference.
In its complaint, the NAACP cites a section of North Carolina law regarding elections which declares that any person or entity who directly or indirectly misrepresents the law to the public through any means of communication “where the intent and the effect is to intimidate or discourage potential voters from exercising their lawful right to vote” shall be guilty of a Class I felony, which carries a prison sentence of three to 12 months.
The complaint further states, “Senator Berger, who has repeatedly taken credit for the voter ID law, knew, or should have known, his statement was false and that it would intimidate and discourage potential voters from exercising their lawful right to vote in October and November 2014.”
NAACP attorney Al McSurely said he believes Berger’s ad “was intentionally designed and vetted by various media types in the extremist wing of the Republican Party to be part of a national strategy” to reduce turnout, according to The Institute for Southern Studies. He added that the senator should run a new ad that clarifies the status of the voter ID requirement.
This complaint is the latest in a series of steps taken by the state NAACP to combat North Carolina’s omnibus election law, which also cut early voting and eliminated same-day registration, straight-ticket voting and out-of-precinct voting on Election Day.
The NAACP and other voting rights groups challenged the law in federal court, saying it discriminated against African Americans and other minorities.
“Without same-day registration, without the full schedule of early voting, without voter protection from vigilante poll watchers, without the ability to cast provisional ballots if you mistakenly go to the wrong precinct, people in North Carolina will be disenfranchised during November’s critical elections,” Barber said, according to an earlier AFRO story. “Disproportionately, those disenfranchised will be people of color, seniors, women, youth, the disabled and other minorities.”
Last month, a federal judge rejected the NAACP’s request for an injunction to block the law from being enforced, but the group is appealing to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, which will hold a hearing on the matter in Charlotte, North Carolina, on Sept. 25.
