Nebr. Secretary of State won’t ask pardons board to restore felons' voting rights

by Zach Wendling, Nebraska Examiner

LINCOLN, Nebr. — Nebraska Secretary of State Bob Evnen did not ask the Board of Pardons at its Aug. 20 meeting to consider restoring voting rights to people who have completed their felony convictions.

Evnen’s office announced he would pull an agenda item for the Aug. 20 meeting of the Pardons Board, of which he is a member, in light of pending litigation before the Nebraska Supreme Court. Evnen’s office said he will not remove existing voters from voting rolls “for now.”

The announcement comes one day after the high court scheduled oral arguments for Aug. 28 in a lawsuit seeking to force Evnen to follow two state laws, brought by Civic Nebraska and other voting rights advocates. The measures would protect the voting rights of convicted felons, who in Nebraska are disproportionately African-American.

“​​The only acceptable path forward is for our state’s election officials to follow the law, which protects these Nebraskans’ right to vote,” Civic Nebraska spokesman Steve Smith said in a statement. “Using the Board of Pardons to restore only *some* Nebraskans’ voting rights would have been an unnecessary half-measure.”

In 2005, the Legislature passed Legislative Bill 53, which mandated that the voting rights disqualification stemming from a felony sentence be “automatically” waived two years after the sentence was completed. LB20, passed this year, ended the disqualification as soon as the sentence was completed. 

On July 17, two days before LB20 took effect, Evnen announced Attorney General Mike Hilgers had issued an opinion that both laws were an unconstitutional encroachment on the executive branch. Hilgers, Evnen, and Gov. Jim Pillen form the Pardons Board, and Pillen declined to sign LB20 into law in April. Both Hilgers and Pillen are Catholics.

Evnen instructed county election officials to stop registering voters with felony convictions unless the Pardons Board had restored their voting rights. He said he intended to bring a motion to pardon those with felony convictions who had registered to vote under the 2005 law, but he has since reversed his stand.

“I am hopeful that the Nebraska Supreme Court will quickly issue a decision prior to the November general election,” Evnen said in a statement. “We will follow whatever direction the Court gives us regarding felon registrations.”

State Sen. Justin Wayne of Omaha, who championed LB20, said during floor debate Thursday that he wasn’t surprised by Evnen’s decision. He said he didn’t fault the Pardons Board because it would need to make decisions involving thousands of impacted voters.

“I don’t know how you do that in the amount of time, so I think that was problematic from the beginning,” Wayne said.

State Sen. Terrell McKinney of North Omaha, who has been a close ally of Wayne on this issue, said the situation “makes no sense” but said he is happy Evnen won’t remove voters from voting rolls.

“It’s just crazy times in this world, in this state, in America where we’re still having to fight for people to have the right to vote,” McKinney said on the legislative floor. “We’re still fighting for the dignity of incarcerated individuals.”

Wayne said that it is up to the courts to decide the laws’ constitutionality. He said people shouldn’t have to file a lawsuit to uphold the law.

“Putting confusion into the process is a form of voter suppression, in my opinion,” Wayne continued. “I have a fundamental problem with any constitutional officer or otherwise elected who can make a decision on their own that something is unconstitutional and decide not to follow the law that we passed.”

Nebraska Examiner is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Nebraska Examiner maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Cate Folsom for questions: info@nebraskaexaminer.com. Follow Nebraska Examiner on Facebook and X.

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