On January 8, 2008, the United States Supreme Court heard arguments inCrawford v. Marion County Election Board, a case related to the discriminatory effects of voter-identification laws in the state of Indiana. Indiana has one of the most stringent voting requirements in the nation, as voters are required to present an up-to-date photo identification issued by the federal or state government in order to cast a ballot. Plaintiffs argued that the Indiana requirements prevent significant and unequal obstacles to the right to vote. The state argued that Indiana had the right to enforce strict requirements to prevent fraud and uphold confidence in the electoral process. Similar laws have also been proposed in many other states, typically related to charges of vote fraud, and often times tied into the divisive debate regarding undocumented immigrants or African American felons. Therefore the recent decision of the Court has tremendous implications to the future of photo-identification laws across the United States.

Previous scholarship on Latino politics has demonstrated that mobilization has a statistically significant effect on voter turnout, suggesting the importance of get-out-the-vote campaigns to increase Latino political participation. Although nonpartisan organizations exist to mobilize Latino voters, most of the phone calls are made by political parties and candidates. I argue that the real test of effectiveness for partisan mobilization is vote choice. Using data from the 2000 presidential election, I model vote choice to determine whether or not Latinos who were contacted by Democrats and Republicans were more likely to vote for Al Gore and George W. Bush. I find that party mobilization by other Latinos is crucial to influencing vote choice. Specifically, Latinos who were contacted by Latino Republicans were significantly more likely to prefer Bush, whereas Latinos who were contacted by non-Latino Republicans were significantly less likely to prefer Bush. Several models are explored.

Over 40 states have considered voter identification laws in recent years, with several adopting laws requiring voters to show a valid ID before they cast a ballot. We argue that such laws have a disenfranchising affect on racial and ethnic minorities, who are less likely than Whites to possess a valid ID. Leveraging a unique national dataset, we offer a comprehensive portrait of who does and does not have access to a valid piece of voter identification. We find clear evidence that people of color are less likely to have an ID. Moreover, these disparities persist after controlling for a host of relevant covariates.

Since the 2000 presidential election, voter education and mobilization have witnessed a renaissance in targeted contact and segmented messaging. Candidates, political parties, and interest groups have taken advantage of advances in electronic databases to divide and subdivide the electorate into different groups and have different messages and messengers for each subgroup of voters.

The 2006 election will best be remembered for returning Democrats to power in both the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives. By almost any metric, November 7 was a bad day for the Republicans. After 12 years of Republican majorities, the Democrats picked up 31 seats in the House and six in the Senate. While significant GOP losses were expected, the results on Election Day were essentially the best case scenario for the Democrats.