2023-05-11 04:42:02
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department has reached an agreement with a New Jersey county over language barriers that will benefit Spanish-speaking voters, highlighting the growing challenge facing some minority communities across the country.
The agreement with Union County was reached after federal prosecutors filed a lawsuit accusing it of failing to conduct voter registration or notify voters, forms, instructions and ballots available in Spanish, in violation of sections of the federal Rights Law. to Vote.
“We know firsthand how language barriers hurt our community,” said Hector Sanchez Barba, chief executive of Mi Familia Vota, a national group that seeks to boost Latino political influence. “Eliminating language barriers is not only legally sound but also the right thing to do to strengthen our democracy.”
The county, which has nearly 28,000 Spanish-speaking citizens of voting age, will be required to print all election materials in English and Spanish, and ensure someone is available to assist Spanish-speaking voters in person. Disabled voters who have long been ignored in the fight for access to the polls will also have to be helped.
The consensual decree, announced Tuesday, will need the approval of a federal judge.
New Jersey is one of several places in the United States where language barriers obstruct access to ballots for minority communities, according to voter advocacy groups. Some Asian American and Asian immigrant communities are particularly affected, said Susana Lorenzo-Ciguere, associate director of the Democracy Program at the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund.
“Despite their long history in the United States, Asian Americans continue to face prejudice in that they are considered perpetual foreigners who are not ‘real Americans’ and do not deserve to be part of the fabric of our democracy,” he said.
Under the Voting Rights Act, communities must provide language assistance to vote if more than 5% of voting-age citizens, or just over 10,000, have limited English proficiency.
It may be more difficult to serve Asian-speaking communities because there are so many languages to consider, said Bob Sakaniwa, director of policy and advocacy for Asia and Pacific Islands for the American Vote. Bangladeshi, Cambodian, Chinese, Filipino, Hmong and Vietnamese languages are just a few, he said.
For example, Asian communities make up a significant portion of Mercer, Houston, and Somerset counties in New Jersey, but the populations do not meet the federal limit to assist them. Arabic-speaking communities are also not reflected in New Jersey’s voting rights legislation, where activist groups are fighting for change.
Union County did not immediately respond when asked how it intended to implement the consent decree.
The New Jersey deal underscores the importance of the federal Voting Rights Act, even though the landmark law has been undermined by Supreme Court decisions and restrictions on voting in Republican-ruled states.
Henal Patel, director of law and policy at the Institute for Social Justice in New Jersey, said it’s important that local authorities abide by the law and that the federal government enforces it.
“This is necessary for voters in these areas so that they can cast their vote with full knowledge of who they are voting for,” Patel said.
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The Associated Press receives support on racial and voting issues from the Jonathan Logan Family Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for the content.
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