Action 103 – NO to LD 1149! URGENT
Background: As you may be aware, for a referendum item to be presented to the voters for an up or down vote, it first has to go through the state legislature, which has the option of enacting it into law, or sending it to the voters to decide (1, 2) This referendum bill, LD 1149 (3). has a public hearing on Friday. It’s possibly even worse than the federal SAVE act. Let’s rally to defeat it in the legislature. The referendum was proposed by Alex Titcomb (4, 5), Laurel Libby’s campaign manager and founder of “The Dinner Table”, a Maine political action committee (6) with a cynically populist vibe.
From the League of Women Voters: “As you all know, we've spotlighted the dangers of the SAVE Act. Now Maine has proposed voter suppression legislation all of its own – LD 1149. A public hearing is scheduled for 11AM Friday, 2 May. Please submit your testimony against the bill. The notion of photo ID may seem innocuous, but the devil is in the details of this bill - which will present insurmountable obstacles to voting for many Mainers and will cause significant expense for the state, ie Maine taxpayers. LD 1149 goes beyond the SAVE Act in obstructing qualified voters and in essentially ending absentee / mail in voting...Please step up and stand up for Maine's highly effective voting system - which successfully enables voter participation by qualified American citizens and which has many layers of election security successfully preventing voter fraud.”
We described some of the noxious provisions of LD 1149 in Action #8, January 7. (https://isledems.org/actionitems - scroll way, way back.). Bottom line: LD 1149 is completely unnecessary, and will cost state and local taxpayer dollars to implement with absolutely no benefit to anyone and a lot of distress to many Mainers. Help defeat it in the legislature now, and in November, when we may have to campaign against it if the Legislature passes it on to the voters.
Action: Testify on Friday. Instructions are here: https://www.mainelegislature.org/testimony/
If that’s not possible for you, at least contact your legislators. Write a letter to the editor.
Urgency: Friday.
Extra Credit:
Ø (1) https://legislature.maine.gov/uploads/originals/road-to-referendum-1.pdf
Ø (2) Article about the signature gathering for this bill: https://mainemorningstar.com/2025/01/06/conservative-group-behind-voter-id-effort-submits-170k-signatures-to-get-on-november-ballot/
Ø (3) LD 1149 text: https://legislature.maine.gov/billtracker/#Paper/IB0001?legislature=132
The fiscal note on the bill is interesting in its own right: https://legislature.maine.gov/legis/bills/bills_132nd/fiscalpdfs/FN114901.pdf
Ø (4) https://clubforgrowthfoundation.org/fellow/alex-titcomb/
Ø (5) https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/club-for-growth/summary?id=D000000763