http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/23/us/governor-terry-mcauliffe-virginia-voting-rights-convicted-felons.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG
APRIL 22, 2016
Gov. Terry McAuliffe of Virginia will use his executive power on Friday to restore voting rights to more than 200,000 convicted felons, circumventing his Republican-run legislature. The action will overturn a Civil War-era provision in the state’s Constitution aimed, he said, at disenfranchising African-Americans.
The sweeping order, in a swing state that could play a role in deciding the November presidential election, will enable all felons who have served their prison time and finished parole to register to vote. Most are African-Americans, a core constituency of Democrats, Mr. McAuliffe’s political party.
The action, which Mr. McAuliffe said was justified under an expansive legal interpretation of his executive clemency authority, goes far beyond what other governors have done, experts say, and will almost certainly provoke a backlash from Virginia Republicans, who have resisted measures to expand felons’ voting rights. It has been planned in secrecy, and comes amid an intensifying national debate over race, mass incarceration and the criminal justice system.
There is no way to know how many of the newly eligible voters in Virginia will register, but Mr. McAuliffe said he would encourage all to do so. “My message is going to be that I have now done my part,” he said.
Advocates who have been working with the governor say they are planning to fan out into Richmond communities Friday afternoon to start registering people. Until now in Virginia, felons could apply to have their voting rights restored, but the process could be cumbersome and those who have committed violent crimes faced a waiting period. That will be eliminated by Mr. McAuliffe’s action.
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