Latest / In Focus with Carolyn Hutcheson / Voter Disenfrachisement - TPR's In Focus - Feb 25, 2026

Transcript

Voter Disenfrachisement - TPR's In Focus - Feb 25, 2026 · In Focus with Carolyn Hutcheson

• 0:00
  >> Kyle Gassiott: Support comes from the Janice Hawkins Cultural
• 0:03
  Arts park on the main campus of Troy University,
• 0:06
  featuring the International Arts center, the Fred
• 0:09
  Nall Hollis Museum and the Huo Bao Zhu Gallery
• 0:14
  More information at troy.edu slash Artspark
• 0:19
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: from Troy Public Radio, this is in Focus. And I'm
• 0:23
  Carolyn Hutcheson. Alabama is one of a handful of
• 0:27
  states who disenfranchise a voter after certain
• 0:31
  felony convictions. Joining us are Dana Ellis, a
• 0:36
  member of the League of Women Voters in
• 0:37
  Birmingham, and Faith in Action Alabama's J.
• 0:42
  Gregory Clark, a formerly incarcerated individual.
• 0:48
  Dana, welcome to the program.
• 0:50
  >> Dana Ellis: I am so happy to be with you.
• 0:52
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: Carolyn, you have a special guest. Can you
• 0:55
  introduce him?
• 0:57
  >> Dana Ellis: I can. My good friend J. Gregory Clark from Faith
• 1:01
  in Action Alabama has joined us today.
• 1:04
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: J. Gregory Clark, welcome to the program. Tell us
• 1:07
  a little bit about yourself.
• 1:09
  >> J. Gregory Clark: Hi, Dana. Hi, Carolyn. I'm J. Gregory Clark with
• 1:12
  Faith in Action Alabama. I have been volunteer
• 1:16
  leading since 2017 with that group and have been
• 1:20
  employed by them since 2022.
• 1:23
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: We are talking today about voting rights
• 1:27
  restoration. Can you define that?
• 1:30
  >> J. Gregory Clark: Voter rights restoration is very important to me,
• 1:34
  Carolyn, because I am one of the many Alabamians
• 1:38
  who have been disenfranchised in the past and have
• 1:42
  actually had to regain my voting rights twice. I
• 1:46
  was disenfranchised because of a conviction. I had
• 1:50
  two convictions in 2012, one of which was on a
• 1:53
  list of crimes which are categorized as crimes of
• 1:56
  moral turpitude, the other of which was an
• 1:59
  inchoate conviction. I served five years in the
• 2:03
  Department of Corrections of Alabama, and upon my
• 2:07
  release I had four years of probation. Once I had
• 2:12
  completed my probation, I became eligible for a
• 2:16
  certificate of eligibility to register to vote.
• 2:20
  And so I immediately wanted my voting rights back.
• 2:23
  And I applied for my certificate of eligibility to
• 2:28
  register to vote. I was initially denied by the
• 2:33
  local registrar's office because they were not
• 2:37
  familiar with Alabama law. And so I employed my
• 2:41
  good friend Dana Ellis of the League of Women
• 2:44
  Voters of Greater Birmingham and and my friend
• 2:47
  Dorie Miles, who is an attorney that works with
• 2:50
  Greater Birmingham Ministries, and they helped
• 2:53
  walk me through the process of educating the
• 2:56
  Jefferson County Registrar's office.
• 2:58
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: Dana, let me ask you, has the Alabama legislature
• 3:02
  tried to address this issue of restoring voting
• 3:06
  rights?
• 3:07
  >> Dana Ellis: It was actually the 2024 legislative session, and
• 3:12
  that's part of J. Gregory's story. So new
• 3:16
  convictions. For many years, the Definition of
• 3:19
  Moral Turpitude act covered about 43, 44
• 3:23
  convictions. J. Gregory got his rights back, and
• 3:28
  then in 2024, they added about 160 new
• 3:34
  convictions.
• 3:36
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: So, Jay Gregory, what Happened then after
• 3:40
  >> J. Gregory Clark: Dana and Dorie helped me get my rights back in
• 3:43
  2021. I lost them again after HB100 was passed,
• 3:49
  which more than tripled the number of convictions
• 3:52
  that can disqualify someone from the vote. And
• 3:55
  that list included my inchoate conviction. So a
• 3:59
  conviction that did not cost me my right to vote
• 4:02
  before the 2024 legislative session wound up
• 4:06
  costing my right to vote because they applied that
• 4:08
  law, HB 100, retroactively, which means I had to
• 4:12
  apply for another certificate of eligibility to
• 4:16
  register to vote, which was then approved. And I
• 4:19
  now have my rights again, but I had to get them
• 4:22
  back twice.
• 4:23
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: Are there other people in this same boat that have
• 4:26
  had to go through this twice?
• 4:27
  >> J. Gregory Clark: I believe more than 800 individuals in Jefferson
• 4:31
  county have been disenfranchised since that law
• 4:35
  was passed. HB100 was passed in 2024, and they
• 4:39
  have been purged from the voter rolls here in
• 4:42
  Jefferson County. So there are lots of people who
• 4:45
  were affected by the passage of HB100.
• 4:48
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: So, Dana, pick up the story from here. Why did the
• 4:52
  League of Women Voters tackle this as an issue?
• 4:56
  >> Dana Ellis: Well, we've been working with this issue since the
• 4:59
  original 2017 definition of moral Turpitude act
• 5:04
  passed. We knew that many people in Alabama did
• 5:08
  not know about this change because there was no
• 5:12
  education done by the state. So we set out to
• 5:17
  first educate people and to then train our
• 5:21
  volunteers in the law so that we could assist
• 5:24
  individuals. And it's become something that we do
• 5:29
  naturally and have been since the law passed in
• 5:32
  17. When HB100 passed. It's just muddied the
• 5:37
  landscape. The fact that they added convictions
• 5:41
  and made them retroactive is just horrifying.
• 5:46
  There might be somebody who had a conviction 20
• 5:50
  years ago, has been voting for 20 years, and
• 5:53
  suddenly gets a letter saying they're taken off
• 5:56
  the rolls. The letter does tell them they can
• 5:59
  apply to get their rights back. A lot of times the
• 6:02
  process to get your rights back goes smoothly, but
• 6:04
  if there's a hiccup in it and don't have somebody
• 6:08
  knowledgeable working with you, then you might get
• 6:11
  denied inappropriately and think there's nothing
• 6:14
  you can do.
• 6:15
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: So has the League of Women Voters approached the
• 6:19
  legislature to help clarify this or look at the
• 6:24
  issue again?
• 6:26
  >> Dana Ellis: There are some bills that are trying to address
• 6:31
  the whole felony disenfranchise process, and J.
• 6:35
  Gregory actually is more familiar with one of
• 6:38
  those.
• 6:38
  >> J. Gregory Clark: There is a group called the Alabama Voting Rights
• 6:41
  Coalition, which includes the Alabama League of
• 6:44
  Women Voters. Faith in Action Alabama, the ACLU
• 6:48
  and SPLC and some others. And we are moving what
• 6:52
  is being called the Voting Rights act for Alabama.
• 6:55
  It's a comprehensive bill that addresses HB100 and
• 6:59
  several other laws that have precluded people like
• 7:02
  myself from being able to vote certainly
• 7:05
  efficiently.
• 7:06
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: Are there any other categories of people who are
• 7:09
  affected by HB100?
• 7:11
  >> J. Gregory Clark: No, but HB100 is specific to people who have
• 7:16
  felony disenfranchisement, meaning they have a
• 7:19
  felony conviction. So people like me. But there
• 7:22
  was another bill passed this session before called
• 7:25
  Senate Bill 1.
• 7:26
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: What were the categories of people named in that
• 7:29
  bill?
• 7:30
  >> J. Gregory Clark: Our military, our college students, and our older
• 7:33
  and disabled population to vote. It precluded
• 7:37
  assistance from anyone in filling out or turning
• 7:40
  in an absentee ballot in Alabama. That was Senate
• 7:44
  Bill 1, and I believe that was passed in the 2023
• 7:46
  session. Is that right, Dan?
• 7:48
  >> Dana Ellis: Dana Correct.
• 7:49
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: That could include quite a number of voters. So it
• 7:53
  sounds to me, Dana, like the League of Women
• 7:56
  Voters is concerned.
• 7:58
  >> Dana Ellis: Yes, as are like J. Gregory alluded to, multiple
• 8:01
  organizations are trying to work on this issue,
• 8:04
  that if anyone gets a letter saying that they are
• 8:09
  no longer on the rolls, there is help available.
• 8:12
  They can call their registrar's office. They can
• 8:15
  reach out to groups in the area of the League of
• 8:18
  Women Voters, Faith in Action Alabama, to
• 8:20
  understand what's going on. I've had a few people
• 8:23
  call me when they've gotten the letter, very
• 8:26
  distressed. And the person who called me did not
• 8:29
  have a conviction. We were able to get her walk
• 8:33
  through that process. But sometimes the person
• 8:35
  needs an advocate working with them to get through
• 8:38
  the system.
• 8:39
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: Democracy is about voter participation. When you
• 8:43
  think about people with disabilities, some of them
• 8:45
  depend on help to vote.
• 8:49
  >> J. Gregory Clark: They were pushing it through based on the fear
• 8:52
  that the absentee ballots could be used to alter
• 8:55
  the outcome of elections.
• 8:57
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: Faith in Action Alabama, what is your organization
• 9:01
  doing?
• 9:02
  >> J. Gregory Clark: We are organizing faith houses around all
• 9:04
  community issues, not just voter rights
• 9:06
  restoration. We also work against gun violence. We
• 9:10
  do other criminal justice work to establish public
• 9:13
  defenders offices. We're working on the sewer
• 9:16
  water crisis in the black belt of Alabama.
• 9:20
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: Well, time is short, but I want to thank both of
• 9:23
  you for being our guests today and drawing
• 9:25
  attention to the issue of voter
• 9:28
  disenfranchisement.
• 9:29
  >> Dana Ellis: Thanks for having us.
• 9:31
  >> J. Gregory Clark: Thank you so much.
• 9:32
  >> Carolyn Hutcheson: Joining us were Dana Ellis, a member of the League
• 9:34
  of Women Voters in Greater Birmingham, and J.
• 9:38
  Gregory Clark with Faith in Action Alabama. Thanks
• 9:42
  for joining us for In Focus, which is a podcast,
• 9:45
  wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Carolyn
• 9:48
  Hutcheson and this is listener supported Troy
• 9:52
  Public Radio.