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Advocacy Group: 'Unprecedented' Number Of Election-Related Bills Could Hurt Disability Community

There are several bills making their way through the Arizona Legislature that could have profound impacts on the disability community. The number of election-related bills introduced this year has alarmed some in the disability community.

Jon Meyers is the executive director of the Arc of Arizona, a disability advocacy group. He is worried about the “unprecedented” number of election bills coming down the pike.

"When we look at the impact they're going to have on communities like those we represent as disability advocates," he said. "We recognize that this is this is a form of disenfranchisement for people in our community, who who are legitimate voters; who are eligible voters; who wish to be able to cast their ballots, and now they're just finding more hurdles placed in their path."

For example,  one bill would require voters to provide some type of personal identification along with their mail-in ballot. And Meyers says in many cases, people with disabilities don’t have state-issued ID. 

"Again, it's not just the disability community that's affected by it," he went on to explain. "It's going to affect lots of marginalized communities, people in outlying rural areas, people in assisted-living facilities, people from from a variety of walks of life."

KJZZ senior field correspondent Kathy Ritchie has 20 years of experience reporting and writing stories for national and local media outlets — nearly a decade of it has been spent in public media.