South Carolina’s constitutional ballot commission – a three-person panel tasked with approving the language for referendums seeking to amend the Palmetto State’s 1895 Constitution – will gather in Columbia, S.C. next week.
On the group’s agenda? Determining whether a proposed question to more tightly define voter eligibility has been properly worded prior to its scheduled appearance on the November 5, 2024 ballot. The panel – which consists of S.C. attorney general Alan Wilson, S.C. election commission director Howie Knapp and S.C. Legislative Council director Ashley Harwell-Beach – will decide “whether the proposed constitutional amendment requires simplified or more detailed explanation before it is submitted to the electorate for approval or disapproval.”
Currently, the state constitution (§ 4, Article II) holds that “every citizen of the United States and of this state of the age of eighteen and upwards who is properly registered is entitled to vote as provided by law.”
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On May 8, 2024, the S.C. General Assembly approved S. 1126, a bill which asks voters to approve amending that section to read as follows: “Only a citizen of the United States and of this State of the age of eighteen and upwards who is properly registered is entitled to vote as provided by law.”
Only three lawmakers – senators Tameika Isaac Devine, Margie Bright Matthews and Mia McLeod – voted against the resolution as it made its way through the legislature.
The integrity of the ballot box has been an issue of concern amid the flood of illegal immigration at the U.S.-Mexican border. As our Dylan Nolan reported just last month, a 2024 study conducted by research and educational institute Just Facts predicted (.xls) that anywhere from 1 million to 2.7 million non-citizens will illegally cast ballots in the upcoming 2024 presidential and congressional elections.
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RELATED | NO MORE FAIR ELECTIONS?
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Sadly, this threat is not new. Two years ago, Hans A. von Spakovsky of The Heritage Foundation published a column lamenting that “in almost all states, election officials are simply relying on individuals who are registering to vote telling the truth when they assert they are U.S. citizens.”
“There’s plenty of evidence that this isn’t working and that aliens are getting registered and voting, often without detection by election officials,” von Spakovsky added.
Sadly, the administration of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris has done everything within its power to block federal laws aimed at safeguarding the integrity of the ballot box. Biden and Harris have also sought to block states from taking action to protect their citizens from the growing threat of illegal alien voting.
Will South Carolina’s proposed constitutional change do anything to enhance electoral integrity? Not really.
“Nothing would really change,” Nolan reported last month. “So long as one can ‘properly register’ with a utility bill (which doesn’t prove citizenship), our elections will continue to feature illegal participation – something state elected officials have demonstrated they have little appetite to change.”
Nonetheless, next week’s meeting of the constitutional ballot commission has been scheduled for Monday, August 12, 2024 at 10:30 a.m. EDT. The meeting will be held in the seventh floor conference room (Room 745) of the attorney general’s office – which is located in the Rembert Dennis office building on the grounds of the S.C. State House.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR …
Will Folks is the owner and founding editor of FITSNews. Prior to founding his own news outlet, he served as press secretary to the governor of South Carolina, bass guitarist in an alternative rock band and bouncer at a Columbia, S.C. dive bar. He lives in the Midlands region of the state with his wife and eight children.
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2 comments
Such MAGA Cult nonsense. If millions of illegals are voting, surely you can find 10,000 or 20,000 to show us. It should be easy right? These are purely made-up numbers. Another lie to the American People.
It’s like pretending violent crime is up under Biden when we know that is a lie, it was higher under Trump. Like pretending immigrants are more likely to commit crimes than American Citizens, when we know that is a lie. It’s just lies on top of lies.
I’m ready to MAGA