April 25, 2014

Anita Johnson, a community organizer with Citizen Action of Wisconsin, spends her days beating the streets—knocking on doors, visiting senior citizen homes, addressing congregations and other groups about changes in election laws.In previous months, her days were spent in Madison at the state capitol, testifying, agitating, shaming the General Assembly about the slew of new restrictive voting laws lawmakers were ramming down the electorate’s throat. But, to no avail.
When Wisconsin voters go to the ballot box in August and November they will have to surmount new barriers to voting.“The climate of voting has changed all over the U.S.—not only in Wisconsin…it’s pretty depressing,” said Johnson, a longtime community activist.

Rep. Gwen Moore, a Wisconsin Democrat, agreed with that assessment.

“This is a life and death struggle for voting rights,” she said.“There have been so many efforts to block the vote here. It is a totally un-American and retrograde situation,” she added. “We hold ourselves up as a beacon of democracy around the world. It’s very embarrassing for people to see these efforts to restrict the vote.”