Evanston’s Rules Committee is scheduled Monday to consider a proposal from Ald. Devon Reid (8th) to let noncitizens vote in municipal elections.
The state constitution says U.S. citizens at least 18 years of age who have been permanent residents of Illinois for at least 30 days have the right to vote. But it does not explicitly bar noncitizens from voting.
Federal law currently bars noncitizens from voting in federal elections and imposes criminal penalties for violations, although at various points in the nation’s history many states allowed noncitizen voting in local, state and federal elections.
Advocates for noncitizen voting argue that noncitizens pay taxes and therefore should be allowed a voice in setting government policies.
A handful of politically progressive communities in a few states have adopted laws recently allowing noncitizen voting in local elections. But courts have ruled such provision unconstitutional in San Francisco and New York.
About 14% of Illinois residents are immigrants and roughly half of those are citizens. The rest are roughly equally split between documented and undocumented immigrants, according to the American Immigration Council.
Reid’s proposal would extend the franchise to only documented noncitizen immigrants. Assuming Evanston’s share of immigrants is similar to that in the rest of the state, that means it would add perhaps 4% more potential eligible voters to the rolls here.
City staff says for the proposal to move forward the City Council would need to adopt a resolution to place the proposal on the March 2024 election ballot. If approved, the change could be implemented for the city’s 2025 municipal election.
The state legislature has considered, but so far not acted on, legislation introduced this year that would permit non-citizens with children in public schools to vote in school board elections. A similar bill, introduced in the last legislative session, failed to win adoption.
In a year full of bad ideas, this is the worst yet. Devon Reid strikes again…
The tragi – comedy is that this hare – brained initiative just *might* be approved by this current City Council…
Respectfully,
Gregory Morrow – Evanston 4th Ward resident
Ha! Maybe so. There is still time for top it though. I would be interested if you posted a top 10 list of bad ideas from Reid, or alderman generally.
I think you would have to exclude the PB items. They would fill all of the top 10.
Sorry John, I strongly disagree. Topless beach has got to be #1.
If they’re documented and paying taxes, I don’t have a big problem with this, but, seriously? This is the issue that needs addressing right now? We have a significant deficit in the City budget, weak infrastructure and, as we read in yesterday’s excellent reporting, a rat problem. Can Reid not, for Pete’s sake, focus on real issues that need solving?
I am truly considering to stop reading our local news. Reid continues to focus on issues that are not pertinent to the real problems this city encounters. He continues to deflect to the actions not critical to this town. From his guidance on the Equity commission and his constant pushing of horrible ideas that just take up time and money. Please 8th ward, vote him out.
Evanston –
find a way to put recall in –
this town cant wait for the next election to put someone else in Ward 8
And here I thought Bozo had retired
According to public sources, Evanston currently has an estimated population of 75,021 individuals of which 52,630 are registered voters in Cook County. With a dismal voter turnout of anywhere between 20% and 30% for recent municipal elections, I think more time and effort should be put into encouraging all current registered voters to actually cast their votes for this city’s elected officials. As a former City Clerk for Evanston, Devon Reid should be more than aware of these numbers.
Sources:
https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/evanston-il-population
https://www.cookcountyclerkil.gov/elections/results-and-election-data/election-data/registration-statistics
https://evanstonroundtable.com/2023/03/30/voter-turnouts-margins-and-more-what-to-know-from-previous-local-elections
Worth a thought only if polls indicate non-citizen voters oppose Reid for re-election.
An inordinate amount of time is spent on his proposals. Can the Council formulate some way to require proposalsto have more than one sponsor on the Council? So that the worst ideas wouldn’t even make it to the table? As for his idea to let non-citizens vote, why not loosen the rules even more? Let Evanston residents vote in any ward they choose. If he’s going to affect my life, I should be able to vote for/against him. I’ll bet he’d argue against it, don’t you?
The Council changed the rules some time back to more-or-less require three supporters for a proposal to advance through the Referrals Committee. That has modestly reduced the volume of submissions. In this case the other people with a vote who indicated support were Mayor Biss and Ald. Geracaris.
— Bill
For anyone seeking to find out what their Evanston City Council member has proposed or voted for/against as of December 24th of last year, here’s the link”
https://evanstonnow.com/how-council-members-bright-ideas-are-faring/ That format was fantastic, great graphics. Especially appreciated the interactive Referrals wheel seeing which members proposed ideas by percentage & how the ideas were faring at that point in time.
To bring that info up to date (since it might be hard to update the “wheel”), members can use the search engine to get info by searching by name since that point in time.
IMO, only by reading local news & staying informed can one see how valuable local news is to any community.