You May Not Be Surprised That….
By 
….Voter ID laws dampen turnout for minorities and young voters.
Researchers at UC-San Diego are working on a study on how voter ID laws affect turnout rates, and a working paper they released detailing the results thus far seems to confirm what the laws’ critics have often said.
Voter ID laws adversely affected the turnout of minorities, and particularly that of Latinos, the paper found. The study also revealed that turnout among Democrats was disproportionately affected, backing up claims of a political motivation behind the laws, which have been overwhelmingly championed by GOP legislators.
“Our study is the first really comprehensive study that’s been done over many election cycles — I think we have something like 51 elections in there — that very clearly shows how minority voters are affected, and how they’re adversely and disproportionately affected compared to their white counterparts,” Nazita Lajevardi, one the study’s authors told TPM.
It’s almost as if the voter fraud talk is really just about gaming the system for white Republicans!
The researchers also tested the hypothesis that the laws were having a larger effect on Democratic turnout, and thus benefiting GOP candidates.
“Not just racial consequences, there are political consequences of these laws. People always surmised that there would be a skew towards the left, but no one has actually shown it,” Lajevardi told TPM.
Indeed, the turnout gap between Republicans and Democrats doubled from 2.3 points to 5.6 points in general elections in strict photo ID states.