Challengers want quick response from Pa. on claims of misleading voter ID ads

A state judge is giving Pennsylvania officials until Tuesday to respond to a petition asking that they correct misleading messages about voter ID.

Challengers are asking for an earlier deadline.

 

Last week, the same people who brought you the protracted legal challenge to the voter identification law took issue with the state again.

They asked a judge to order the state to stop misleading ads and correct false messages to make sure voters know they don’t need photo ID to vote in November.

They specifically mention outdated mailings and misleading robo-calls planned for the “very near future.”

The judge has given the state a chance to respond, with its deadline one week before Election Day.

That wouldn’t allow enough time to correct misinformation, says Vic Walczak of the ACLU of Pennsylvania, one of the legal challengers.

“We will be filing a motion asking the court to reconsider the deadline for the commonwealth’s response,” he said Wednesday.

Walczak says his group will ask the judge to bump the deadline up to give the state only until the end of Thursday to respond.

Joining in the that effort is the nonpartisan Committee of Seventy, which also urged Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson to accelerate the deadline.

“Voters deserve straightforward, unequivocal information,” said Zack Stalberg, president of the watchdog group based in Philadelphia. “Setting a deadline just one week before the election effectively precludes any meaningful remedial action the judge might order.”

Earlier this month, the voter ID law was partially blocked, meaning voters will not have to show photo ID on Election Day, Nov. 6.