Emancipate NC’s Kerwin Pittman has been working in partnership with VoteRiders, a non-partisan, non-profit organization with a mission to ensure that all citizens can exercise their freedom to vote. VoteRiders informs and helps citizens secure their voter ID and inspires and supports organizations, local volunteers, and communities to sustain voter ID education and assistance efforts.
In a recent article, Kerwin and VoteRiders discuss their important work to advance the rights and livelihoods of justice-impacted individuals in North Carolina. They discuss Kerwin’s journey from prison to this work, the consequential election season ahead, the Second Chance Act, and NC’s voter ID laws that impact formerly incarcerated citizens:
It’s hard for justice-impacted individuals to get ID because there’s a gap in the system. The system locks you up and makes it extremely difficult for you to gather your items — like a birth certificate or other items you need to acquire identification. The system doesn’t prepare you beforehand and there is a lack of coordination on the side of the institution.
It can be really difficult if you’re someone who doesn’t have family support, you don’t know where your birth certificate is, or maybe you never even had an ID before because you were just dealing with different things.
And it’s a multitude of factors that contribute to the detriment of a family, right? If I’m coming home after being incarcerated and I’ve become the main provider for my family, but I don’t have identification, now I have to work under the table, which ultimately may lead me back into the justice system. So this is why it’s extremely important that returning citizens get their ID right away.
Luckily, a new Executive Order was recently issued and one of the goals of the Executive Order is to coordinate with the DMV to try to fill the gap, to make it easier for returning citizens to secure ID.
Click here to read the full article and learn more about Emancipate NC and VoteRider’s partnership.