CNN recently ran a story on Voter ID showing 83% of Americans support requiring voters to show ID when voting. Not only is this a huge majority, it’s growing. The report went back through seven years of polling by Pew, showing 76% support from 2018 to 2023, then increasing to 81% in 2024 and 83% in 2025. There is overwhelming majority support across all party and racial demographic lines. The reporter even had to exclaim, “It’s not controversial.” It’s not! It’s common sense. So why won’t Vermont politicians pass a voter ID law?

Vermont is one of only fourteen states that don’t have any requirement for voter ID when voting. Election officials have no tools, especially when voters cast ballots by mail, which is now about two-thirds of the time, to verify that the votes counted were actually cast by the voters being crossed off the checklist. Our election system is not secure.

Critics are careful to say there is “no evidence” of voter fraud in Vermont, and this is a solution in search of a problem. But a system that is totally incapable of determining if a ballot is legitimate or fraudulent will never produce evidence of fraud. The truth is, we have no idea how much fraud is taking place in Vermont elections. We do know that it’s very easy to commit absentee ballot fraud in Vermont elections, we are totally reliant on the honor system to keep bad actors from cheating, and politics is about the least honorable activity humans engage in. So, help bring back confidence in our election system and pass Voter ID.

-Lynn LaFleur, Stowe