A collection of bills aimed to enhance voting access in Alabama were never considered by committees during the 2025 legislative session, but advocates say the fight for enhanced voting rights in Alabama is not over.
HB 59, sponsored by Rep. Thomas Jackson, D-Thomasville, would have required one early voting precinct in each county for one week before Election Day. According to a study by the Center for Election Innovation and Research (CEIR), about 70% of the ballots cast nationwide in 2020 were cast before Election Day, and 40% were cast before Election Day in 2016. In 2016, 25% of ballots nationwide were cast through early in-person voting, of the states that offer the option, according to the study.
“Senior citizens really brought it to my attention,” Jackson said in an interview on Monday. “So I drafted it, and I put it the simplest way that I could do it: a week out before the election, four days prior to the elections, and nobody liked that. Republicans don’t like that.”
Alabama does not allow early voting and does not have no-excuse absentee voting. Amid the COVID pandemic in 2020, state leaders effectively allowed anyone to cast an absentee ballot, but that was rescinded after the election.
The League of Women Voters of Alabama supported the measures. Kim Bailey, president of the league, said in an interview Thursday that the bills would expand access to voting in Alabama, which would increase voter turnout in the state.
“You can make a plan, but if something comes up on voting day, you may not be able to get to the ballot box,” Bailey said. “Voting as a right and not a privilege. I think that’s important that they’d be able to exercise that right.”
In 2024, there were 3.7 million people registered to vote in Alabama, according to the Secretary of State’s website. But only 2.2 million (59%) people voted in the 2024 Presidential election. That was significantly less than the national voter turnout of 88% in 2024, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and the lowest percentage of Alabama voters to cast ballots in a presidential election since 1988.
The bill was assigned to the House Constitution, Campaigns and Elections Committee, but Rep. Bob Fincher, R-Woodland, chair of the committee, said he did not take HB 59 up in his committee because he is not in favor of early voting due to the cost to the state.
“It costs the state extra money when you vote early,” he said. “If there’s a change in the campaign, you cannot go back and change your vote.”
The Legislative Services Agency did not provide a fiscal note for any of the election access related bills. Although a total cost is not available, Bailey said early voting would utilize state employees that are already working and would be held at locations that are already staffed.
“That wouldn’t require a lot of infrastructure cost in those kinds of things, so depending on what the legislation that passes the cost could be not really very much,” Bailey said.
Jackson said the potential cost to the state for a week of early voting would be much less than the cost to the state for unconstitutional bills and the congressional redistricting trial. In the state’s General Fund budget, a $300,000 line item was added for “reapportionment litigation fees.”
“We don’t have an idea of the cost to the state. Look at all these lawsuits, these millions of dollars that are being paid to lawyers for these unconstitutional bills. That’s a cost to the state,” Jackson said. “See, they can come up with any excuse when they don’t want something.”
Jerome Dees, the Alabama policy director at the Southern Poverty Law Center, said in an interview Thursday that he was not surprised the bills were not considered. He said the state has been regressing in voting access and inclusivity for the last decade.
“This bill is really kind of an effort to try and present a new vision of what democracy can and should be in Alabama, which is kind of the home of the civil rights movement,” Dees said.
In fact, Dees said the state’s congressional redistricting trial has highlighted the need for more voter protections and access.
“The fact that not a single one of these bills that aimed to expand voter access to create oversight over the redistricting process, whether that’s at the municipal level, drawing of city council districts or at the state and federal level,” Dees said. “According to the federal courts, is obviously a problem, just based on recent rulings. The fact that the Legislature intentionally chose not to touch any of those, I think, is as telling as anything.”
In 2021, the Alabama Legislature approved congressional district maps that were later challenged in court and struck down in 2022 by a three-judge panel, which ordered the districts to be redrawn. In 2023, the Legislature redrew the maps, which were again challenged by plaintiffs for not meeting the court’s requirement of allowing Black voters to elect a candidate of their choice in a second district.
The court struck down the 2023 map passed by the Legislature and appointed a special master to submit three potential remedial maps in time for the 2024 election. The Alabama Attorney General’s Office said last month the state may forgo drawing new congressional district maps before 2030 to prevent federal oversight of future redistricting, pausing the redistricting for five years.
HB 97, sponsored by Rep. Kenyatté Hassell, D-Montgomery, would have allowed voters to cure their absentee ballot affidavit if they submit them before the election and the absentee election manager finds an error. Currently, the ballots are set aside and not counted if election officials find a defect with the affidavits.
Hassell said in an interview on Wednesday that the bill would have given absentee voters a better chance for their ballot to be counted.
“People were making mistakes on their ballots, and even though they didn’t know they made mistakes,” he said. “We might have people who voted on an absentee ballot for the last 20 years, and their vote never counted because they made the same mistake over and over again not knowing they made that mistake.”
The bill was assigned to Fincher’s committee, but Fincher said he did not take it up because of conversations with Hassell and the Secretary of State Wes Allen.
“I’ve been very clear, I believe in Election Day, not Election month,” Allen said in a statement Monday.
Hassell raised concerns that the executive branch had control over what bills did or did not get taken up in committee.
“When one person in the executive branch has an agenda, that shouldn’t dictate if we all feel like this is a good piece of legislation that’ll help the citizens,” Hassell said. “That’s why we have a House. That’s why we have a Senate.”
HB 31, sponsored by Rep. Adline Clarke, D-Mobile, allows people with a disability, or those unable to read or write, to designate someone to assist them with delivering an absentee ballot application or the absentee ballot itself, to the election manager.
Messages seeking comment from Clarke were left Wednesday and Monday.
Dees and Bailey expect the bills to be filed again for the 2026 Legislative Session.
“We’re going to keep filing this year, I’m gonna keep filing until something happens,” Jackson said. “We just have to keep hitting that rock until they crack. That’s why I’m still pushing it, because it’s the right thing to do, and the people of the state want it.”
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