State Ballot Measures on Voter ID, Billionaire Tax and Child Protection Face Voters on Election Day

Voters in several states decide ballot measures on Tuesday's Election Day, including voter ID requirements in six states and a California proposal for a one-time 5 percent tax on certain assets above $1 billion. While most attention is on control of the House and Senate, the state measures cover voting rules, partisan gerrymandering, taxes and child protection. On voter ID, Ohio and North Carolina already require identification, but measures would write that into their state constitutions. Nevada is trying to amend its constitution to require photo ID, Arizona has a measure requiring mail-in voters to show ID, and California and Colorado will consider similar proposals. California's Proposition 40 needs a simple majority, but it could be blocked if competing Propositions 41 or 42 get more yes votes. Prediction markets expect it to lose. Florida voters will weigh Amendment 3. A Nebraska law on child protection has been in effect for over a year.

The left-leaning New Republic frames the measures as a fight over democracy. It quotes Chris Melody Fields Figueredo of the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center and Hannah Ledford of the Fairness Project on attacks on voters' rights, ties some ID measures to President Trump's SAVE America Act, and cites experts who say ID laws suppress Black, student and Native voters. The right-leaning Federalist focuses elsewhere. Its headline accuses the media of lying about child protection measures, and its excerpt says there is no evidence from Nebraska that strangers are making children expose themselves to play youth sports. The two sides share only the premise that state measures matter. They differ on which measures they cover and on whom they blame for misleading the public. Alternative outlet ZeroHedge takes a separate economic angle, focusing on California's billionaire tax and projections that it could lose revenue.