Outrageous Voter ID Comparison Hits the College Campus

Matt Jordan, Associate Professor of Film at Penn State University, had his students watch the film The Birth of a Nation, which supports the Ku Klux Klan, and the movie was then followed by news clips of commentators blasting voter ID laws.  Professor Jordan later explained to a student that, “I was - indeed - trying to elicit moral comparisons with this juxtaposition.”

This is not the first time such a comparison has been made.  Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) said that voter ID is “Ku Klux Klan without hoods.”  Phil Noble, the president of the South Carolina New Democrats, said, “Instead of having hoods and Klan meetings, we’ve dressed it up as law.”  In addition, former NAACP Executive Director Benjamin Chavis complained about the Virginia House of Delegates considering voter ID by saying, “what sort of delegate, what kind of delegate would lynch democracy?”

Surveys continue to show that large majorities of Americans continue to support voter ID and do not think it discriminates against minorities.  

When DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz made the comparison of voter ID to Jim Crow, the response questioning this type of comparison led her to retract her comments.  A conservative student in Jordan’s class wrote to Professor Jordan inquiring about the meaning of this juxtaposition, but it remains to be seen whether the professor will really apologize for this outrageous comparison.