Virginia Organizing Chairperson Sandra A. Cook offered praise for Gov. Bob McDonnell after the governor’s office announced today a set of procedures for the new, more automated process of restoration of civil rights for former nonviolent felons.
“For 15 years Virginia Organizing has been working in the state to make sure those people who have paid their debt to society and served their sentences for felonies would regain their right to vote automatically. Today, we celebrate Virginia’s step forward by making this process more automated and objective for former non-violent offenders,” Cook said.
“For those who have been waiting to get their rights to vote back, this is a huge victory and a gigantic step in being accepted and integrated as an active participant in the community,” Cook said. “Virginia Organizing will continue to work with the Governor’s Office, the Secretary of the Commonwealth, and other community stakeholders to ensure that information about the process to restore civil rights to those who qualify for the new process is shared widely in our state. We will also continue to fight for a constitutional amendment that would automatically restore civil rights to all former felons.”
The ACLU of Virginia took a different tack, pointing out that while up to 6,000 disenfranchised Virginians will be able to have their rights restored before the October registration deadline for the fall election, this also means that more than 350,000 Virginians will remain disenfranchised under the governor’s program despite fully completing their sentences.
“While the ACLU of Virginia continues to commend the governor for the progress he has made in restoring voting rights when compared to his predecessors, the yardstick against which his efforts are being measured is one that sets the bar way too low to define the new program as a ‘success’,” said ACLU Executive Director, Claire G. Gastañaga. “This new policy can only have the purported fundamental impact described by the Governor at the press conference announcing the program if the Governor is willing to take much bolder action. We continue to believe that the Governor could accelerate the process by granting blanket restoration to classes of people by executive order,” Gastañaga said.
“Particularly disturbing was the failure of the governor to respond affirmatively to a request by the ALCU of Virginia and other advocates that he classify most drug offenses as non-violent just as they are classified under state sentencing rules,” added Hope Amezquita, Staff Attorney and Legislative Counsel for the ACLU of Virginia.
“While the ACLU commends the governor for listening to concerns expressed about the surprise recategorization of breaking and entering and burglary following last month’s press conference, we continue to be profoundly disappointed that the governor’s ‘automatic’ program will not extend to non-violent drug offenders,” Amezquita continued. “Given the racial disparities in arrests and sentencing of drug offenders in Virginia documented in the ACLU’s recently issued report, ‘The War on Marijuana in Black and White: Billions of Dollars Wasted on Racially Biased Arrests,’ the governor’s failure to choose to classify drug offenses as non-violent will do nothing but continue the effects of racial discrimination in the criminal justice system,” Amezquita concluded.
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