California Governor Gavin Newsom has signed a controversial new legislation prohibiting local governments from imposing voter identification requirements at polling places.
The legislation targets a voter-approved measure in Huntington Beach that mandated photo identification at polling locations.
Huntington Beach had asserted its authority as a charter city to establish local election protocols.
But the claim faced swift opposition from state officials.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta and Secretary of State Shirley Webeer filed a law suit to invalidate their voter ID requirement in April.
“The right to freely cast your vote is the foundation of our democracy, and Huntington Beach’s voter ID policy flies in the face of this principle,” Attorney General Bonta stated when announcing the lawsuit.
As ZeroHedge noted, California remains one of only 14 states that do not mandate voter identification at polling places.
The new law is part of Democratic lawmakers’ efforts to standardize election practices across the state.
Governor Newsom also signed another bill that enhanced the Secretary of State’s oversight of election systems with clearer guidelines for election data management.
The bill seeks to prevent conservative jurisdictions like Huntington Beach and Shasta County from implementing election policies to prevent voter fraud.
The news comes just days after conservative satire site The Babylon Bee filed a lawsuit against the state of California after Newsom signed a series of “deep fake” laws targeting outlets publishing parody.”
“The legislature heard the call and passed two laws that forbid political expression under the label of ‘materially deceptive content,’” the lawsuit asserts.
According to the complaint, one of California’s new laws will require social media platforms to notify the state with “reports about user posts with ‘materially deceptive content’ and then remove or label them.”
Newsom argued that the state’s laws focus on AI-generated content that could “undermine the public’s trust through disinformation.”
However, the new law also requires satire and parody content to be clearly labeled or removed completely.
READ: Almost 3 MILLION Non-Citizens to Vote in 2024 Election, Study Says
