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ProEnglish praises letter by fifty-six House Members urging Judiciary Chairman Sensenbrenner not to extend bilingual ballot provisions of Voting Rights Act
McAlpin said, "There is no reason for Congress to renew bilingual ballots, which were tacked on to the Voting Rights Act as a temporary remedy ten years after the Act was passed. Two different General Accounting Office (GAO) reports have shown that bilingual ballots are a costly, unfunded mandate on state and local governments, and that they are hardly ever used," he added. "Even worse," McAlpin pointed out, "they are totally unnecessary. Federal law specifically says that any voter who can't read a ballot in English can take an interpreter into the voting booth with them. So nobody is being denied the opportunity to cast a fully informed vote." The bipartisan letter signed by fifty-six members of the House included
seven members of the Judiciary Committee that Sensenbrenner chairs. They
are Rep. Howard Coble (NC), Rep. Louie Gohmert (TX), Rep. Bob Goodlatte
(VA), Rep. John Hostettler (IN), Rep. Bob Inglis (SC), Rep. William Jenkins
(TN), and Rep. Steven King (IA). McAlpin testified against renewing the bilingual ballot provisions of the Voting Rights Act as one of four members of a panel appearing before the House Subcommittee on the Constitution this past November. |
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