Time Range For Action Alert:
May 2, 2022 to May 4, 2022Legislators only have until this Wednesday to pass two vital voter protection bills. You may have called Senate President Looney recently--thank you! Can you help us push these bills over the finish line by making a call right after you read this alert?
Action:
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Call your State Senator and urge them to pass SB 431 that will Ban Foreign Spending on State Ballot Measures, and SB 471 to enact a Connecticut Voting Rights Act! Leave a message if you go to a staff member's voicemail.
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Depending on what happens in the Senate in the next 24 hours, be ready to call your State Representative with the same message.
Find out who represents you here and use the LWVCT Directory of Elected Officials to find their contact information.
About the bills:
Senate Bill 431 - AN ACT CONCERNING REFERENDA, INDEPENDENT EXPENDITURES AND CERTAIN OTHER POLITICAL SPENDING will ban foreign spending on state ballot measures. This will protect the Referendum Question on Early Voting--which will appear on the November 8, 2022 ballot--from anti-democratic foreign actors' intererence.
Protecting the integrity of our electoral processes is the most basic of the League’s priorities. This bill applies the same limitations against foreign interference in referendum measures that are already in place for other elections.
Senate Bill 471 - AN ACT CONCERNING ELECTIONS AND STATE VOTING RIGHTS, will enact a Connecticut Voting Rights Act to provide voters of color and other protected groups additional protections against voter suppression.
Connecticut needs its own voting rights act. Despite Connecticut's progressive reputation, voters of color and other protected groups face longer voting lines and are disproportionately impacted by the absence of early voting, by limited access to absentee voting, by insufficient language assistance for voters who don't speak English and by outright voter intimidation.
Please call your State Senator now. Here’s an idea of what to say when you call:
Hi, this is [NAME], and I’m calling you from [TOWN] to ask you to pass SB 431 that will Ban Foreign Spending on State Ballot Measures – as well as SB 471 to enact a Connecticut Voting Rights Act that will provide Black and Brown voters additional protections against voter suppression. Thank you!
Log your call by emailing advocacy [at] lwvct.org and letting us know who you talked to, what you said, and how they responded.
We are down to the wire - please be ready to call your State Representative with the same message before the end of the legislative session on Wednesday.
Thank you!
