These States Are Doing the Most to Rob Minority Voters on Super Tuesday

Super Tuesday: The political equivalent of the opening day of March Madness. Candidates are scrambling around a dozen states looking to win as many delegates as possible to advance to the final general election. And while demography and ideology will both play huge roles in determining the victors, Tuesday’s elections will also be instrumental in forecasting the future of voting rights and ballot access, particularly for people of color.

There are three major clouds hanging over at least a third of the Super Tuesday states: Recent changes to voter ID laws, the disenfranchisement of those who’ve been convicted of felonies in the past, and racial gerrymandering. Each of these problems exists in force across a broad swath of Southern states among the Super Tuesday run. Any certainties about how black or Latino voters will vote this year are critically compromised by the lack of resolution around these new barriers to casting ballots. But Tuesday’s outcomes will offer some clarity about the real burden of these changes for voters of color, especially first-time voters.