Voting Opportunities and Integrity in the Conduct of Elections Act of 2008
Latest action · Jun 6, 2008 Read twice and referred to the Committee on Rules and Administration.
Progress
Where this bill reached, and when. A stage with no date was not reached; one that failed a vote and later carried shows the date it carried.
- IntroducedJun 6, 2008
- Passed SenateNot reached
- Passed HouseNot reached
- To the PresidentNot reached
- Became lawNot reached
Summary
Voting Opportunities and Integrity in the Conduct of Elections Act of 2008 - Amends the Help America Vote Act of 2002 to: (1) allow individuals to vote in an election before the date of the regularly scheduled election; (2) require the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) to issue standards for administration of such voting; and (3) require each state to permit any person otherwise qualified to vote in a federal election to vote in a manner other than in person, and impose no conditions or restrictions on absentee voting other than a reasonable deadline for requesting and returning the ballot.
Directs the EAC to establish a Vote by Mail grant program.
Requires each federal election voting system to require the use of or produce an individual, durable, voter-verified, paper ballot of the voter's vote, available for voter inspection and verification before the vote is cast and counted.
Directs the Director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology to study, test, and develop best practices to enhance the accessibility of ballot verification mechanisms for individuals with disabilities, for voters whose primary language is not English, and for voters with difficulties in literacy.
Prohibits the use of: (1) uncertified election dedicated voting system technologies; and (2) any voting system unless its manufacturer and the election officials using it meet applicable security requirements.
Provides for mandatory availability of paper ballots at polling places.
Requires the Director of the National Science Foundation to make research grants for development of election-dedicated voting system software.
Requires states to make unannounced random hand counts of the voter-verified paper ballots in a federal election.
Directs the EAC to establish: (1) a pre-registration implementation grant program; (2) an automatic re-registration grant program; and (3) a computerized system capable of communicating and exchanging data among participating states (interoperability).
Prohibits voter caging practices (those preventing voting or registration through the reliance by officials on certain non-forwardable or non-returned documents).
Cosponsors
Members who signed on, in the order they did.
Committees 1
Where it was sent and what each committee and subcommittee did with it, in order.
| Chamber | Committee | What it did |
|---|---|---|
| Senate | Rules and Administration Committee | Referred Jun 6, 2008 |
Actions 2
Everything that happened, newest first.
- Jun 6, 2008Introduced in Senate
- Jun 6, 2008Read twice and referred to the Committee on Rules and Administration.
Research
What has been written about this bill: committee reports, cost estimates, the sponsor’s authority statement, printed hearings and the Congressional Research Service’s work.
CRS reports 1
Congressional Research Service work that CRS links to this bill or the law it became, newest first.
Cite it 1
Products on other subjects that cite it, usually among other measures.
| Product | Title | Kind | Published |
|---|---|---|---|
| R40609 | The National Voter Registration Act of 1993: History, Implementation, and Effects Archived | Report | Sep 18, 2013 |
Titles 2
Every title it has carried, official and short, at each stage.
- Official Title as Introduced
- A bill to require early voting in Federal elections, to prohibit restrictions on absentee voting in Federal elections, to establish a grant program to promote voting by mail, and for other purposes.
- Short Titles as Introduced
- Voting Opportunities and Integrity in the Conduct of Elections Act of 2008
Subjects
Assigned by the Library of Congress. Policy area: Government Operations and Politics.
- Absentee voting
- Ballots
- Computer software
- Congress
- Congressional elections
- Disabled
- Economics and Public Finance
- Election administration
- Election Assistance Commission
- Election Day
- Electronic data interchange
- English language
- Federal aid to research
- Government Operations and Politics
- Governmental investigations
- Grants-in-aid
- Illiteracy
- Postal service
- Presidential elections
- Research grants
- Science, Technology, Communications
- Security measures
- Standards
- State laws
- Voter registration
- Voting
- Voting machines
- Voting of the disabled
Text 1
Each version as it was printed, newest first.
- Jun 6, 2008Introduced in Senate
Everything here is as published by Congress: the summary is the Congressional Research Service's, the action wording is the clerks', and the subjects are the Library of Congress's. How far it got is read from the actions themselves, taking the most recent one of each kind, so a bill that failed a vote and later passed is shown as having passed. Records come from this bill on Congress.gov and govinfo.gov; cost estimates are the Congressional Budget Office's, and the hearings are the printed hearings GovInfo publishes, which can appear months after the hearing.
