MYTH:
Voter ID requirements are ineffective in preventing potential voter fraud.
FACT:
Voter ID laws, in addition to preventing impersonation fraud at the polls, prevent the misuse and theft of absentee ballots if identification is required for both forms of voting—which is as it should be. Such laws can also prevent voting under fictitious voter registrations or voting by non-citizens. Voter ID laws may prevent double voting by individuals who are registered in more than one state or locality if their IDs do not match their registration information or if they try to use IDs from other states to vote. A majority of states have passed and implemented voter ID laws to prevent election fraud. Every state that has an ID requirement also provides a free ID to anyone who does not already have one.
MYTH:
Requiring a voter ID depresses turnout and suppresses minority voters.
FACT:
The biggest myth is that voter ID laws depress turnout, especially by minority voters. Years of turnout data show that the opposite is true. Wherever photo ID requirements have been implemented, registration and turnout rates have increased. A 2019 National Bureau of Economic Research study of turnout in all 50 states concluded that voter ID “laws have no significant negative effect on registration or turnout, [either] overall or for any subgroup defined by age, gender, race, or party affiliation.”¹⁴ A 2022 study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences concluded that voter ID requirements seem to increase turnout because they “motivate and mobilize supporters of both parties.”¹⁵
MYTH:
Races are never that close, so fraud—even if it occurs—doesn’t matter.
FACT:
Many elections, from town council to President of the United States, have been decided by razor-thin margins. The Public Interest Legal Foundation has collected information on elections in which there were tied votes—where a single vote would have changed the outcome. The PILF’s database catalogs hundreds of U.S. elections, most of them within the past 20 years, that ended in ties or were decided by a single vote. This clearly demonstrates that one vote—legal or illegal—can determine the winner of a race.
The following are just a few recent examples in which a handful of votes decided the outcome of an election that had significant impact:
ENDNOTES:
14. Enrico Cantoni and Vincent Pons, “Strict ID Laws Don’t Stop Voters: Evidence from a U.S. Nationwide Panel, 2008–2018,” National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper No. 25522, February 2019, revised May 2021, pp. 1–2, https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w25522/w25522.pdf (accessed July 24, 2025).
15. Jeffrey J. Harden and Alejandra Campos, “Who Benefits from Voter Identification Laws?” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 120, No. 7 (February 6, 2023), e2217323120, p. 1, https://www.pnas.org/ doi/epdf/10.1073/pnas.2217323120 (accessed July 24, 2025).
16. Gary Robertson, “Republican Wins Lottery-Style Drawing in Tied Virginia State House,” Reuters, January 4, 2018, https://www.reuters.com/article/world/republican-wins-lottery-style-drawing-in-tied-virginiastate-house-idUSKBN1ET1XX/ (accessed July 24, 2025).
17. Press release, “Newly Released 2016 Election Administration and Voting Survey Provides Snapshot of Nation’s Voter Turnout, Registration Trends, Voting Systems,” United States Elections Assistance Commission, June 29, 2017, https://www.eac.gov/news/2017/06/29/newly-released-2016-election-administration-and-voting-survey-provides-snapshot (accessed July 24, 2025).
18. Tim Meko, Denise Lu, and Lazaro Gamio, “How Trump Won the Presidency with Razor-Thin Margins in Swing States,” The Washington Post, November 3, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/2016-election/swing-state-margins/ (accessed July 24, 2025).
19. Federal Election Commission, Federal Elections 2000: Election Results for the U.S. President, the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives, June 2021, pp. 4 and 18, https://www.fec.gov/resources/cms-content/documents/federalelections00.pdf (accessed July 24, 2025).