Lift every voice and ask the Senate to support HB 70

As the Kentucky General Assembly enters the final days of the 2014 session, your voice is needed to help move voting rights legislation across the finish line.

Take Action

Please call the legislative message line today at 1-800-372-7181. Leave this message for your state senator: “I urge you to restore voting rights by supporting HB 70. Please ask your leadership to move this bill to a conference committee, and to reach a just agreement with the House. Now is the time.”

Background

Kentucky is among a small handful of states that take away a person’s right to vote forever if convicted of a felony, unless they receive a partial pardon from the governor. As a result, there are more than 186,000 citizens living in our state who have completed their full sentence but are unable to vote in our democracy.

HB 70 is a proposed constitutional amendment that would automatically restore voting rights to most people as soon as they have completed their full sentence. It has passed the Kentucky House 8 years in a row with wide bipartisan support, but has stalled each year in the Senate.

This year for the first time ever the Senate took up the measure. But senators made so many changes to the bill that it no longer resembled the original bill in any way, shape or form. In fact, an analysis by the League of Women Voters says that the Senate version would continue to disenfranchise more than 100,000 Kentuckians, more than half of those currently affected.

The House refused to accept the Senate changes, and sent the bill back to the Senate for its consideration. That’s where the bill now sits, awaiting action by Senate leaders.

In order for HB 70 to pass during this legislative session, Senate leaders need to allow the bill to be voted on, again, to allow the full Senate to decide whether to recede or not recede from its amendments. If a disagreement still exists, they would need to appoint a conference committee to hammer out a compromise with the House. That agreement, if one can be reached, would then go back to each chamber for a final vote. All of these steps must be completed before the 2014 session ends in mid-April.

Because HB 70 is a constitutional amendment, getting the bill through the legislative process is a necessary step towards putting the issue on the ballot for all Kentucky voters to consider in November.

The Legislative Message Line (1-800-372-7181) is open from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. Monday through Thursdays, and until 6 p.m. on Fridays.

Thanks for taking action!