> I haven't voted in a long time, but the last time I did - I think they just asked me what my name is and I didn't show any kind of ID. They then check if the

> I haven't voted in a long time, but the last time I did - I think they just asked me what my name is and I didn't show any kind of ID. They then check if the name you gave is on their list of voters. If it is, you get a ballot, and they check that name off the list. If it's not you get a provisional ballot and who knows what happens to that. This various by region, but the procedure where I live is that you are registered to vote in a district. When you go to vote you provide your name and, if necessary to disambiguate, an address. The poll worker finds you and checks you off. Then you vote. If two people try to use the same registration, this catches that. > All this is to say that the politicians who believe voter ID would reduce their share of the vote consider it exclusionary. Politicians who believe voter ID would increase their share of the vote do not. The voter ID debate does concern whose ox is being gored. The party whose constituents are poorer and less mobile is the party whose voting share will go down with voter ID laws, depending on the law, because acquiring the ID allowed by the law may take travel and expense which is prohibitive to their voters. The argument for ID is that it will prevent in-person voter fraud. The argument against it is that the fraud it will prevent is negligible, the number of people it will disenfranchise is not negligible, and that the actual incidents of voter fraud, or election fraud, that should be prevented are not in-person voter fraud. TLDR; voter ID laws will decrease participation and the laws can be gamed, by choosing acceptable forms of ID and whatnot, to selectively decrease one party or the other's voter base. Also, there is no evidence that this prevents fraudulent votes swaying elections and there is evidence that it has partisan bias, which will sway elections. A solution: issue a federal ID delivered to voters at no expense. This is not on the table.