Former Vice President Al Gore argued for improved voting access this week, saying every U.S. citizen should be automatically registered to vote.
“This is really and truly un-American,” Gore said during an appearance on “CNN Tonight with Don Lemon” on Monday while discussing GOP efforts to imposing greater voting restrictions, including limiting absentee voting.
“It is a naked effort to try and suppress Black, brown and indigenous votes,” the former Democratic vice president asserted.
Gore argued the U.S. benefits when more people with varied experiences and perspectives are given a say, and pushed back on efforts to limit absentee voting, amid other restrictions.
“There’s no record of voter fraud. One or two little cases every once in a while,” he declared.
“We ought to invite everyone in to the voting booth and have everyone take part in helping to guide this nation,” he added.
Republicans in various states have criticized absentee voting and advanced new restrictions following claims of voter fraud made by former President Trump and others during the 2020 presidential election.
The left-leaning Brennan Center for Justice said last month that legislators in dozens of states have pressed forward this year with bills seeking to limit voting.
Gore emphasized Monday that instead of making voting more difficult, especially for marginalized populations, the U.S. should take other steps to expand voting access.
“We ought to have voting on weekends instead of on Tuesday, on a work day,” said Gore, who launched a national voter registration campaign in partnership with the Climate Reality Action Fund in 2020.
Democrats have long pushed for automatic voter registration, with several states, including New York, New Mexico, Nevada and Massachusetts passing measures to allow the practice in recent years. These automatic voter registration measures are modeled around an “opt-out” system instead of an “opt-in” plan.
Hawaii advanced a measure last month that would allow those eligible to vote to automatically be registered when they apply for a driver’s license or state identification card.