13-03-2025
Election bills pass Senate committee
Two elections bills, which would change some election day procedures and would create a unit to investigate election complaints, were approved by a Senate committee Wednesday morning in Frankfort.
House Bill 455 and House Bill 684 were approved Wednesday by the Senate State and Local Government Committee. The bills will next go to the Senate floor for a vote. Both previously passed the House.
House Bill 455 would create an Office of Election Investigations and Security within the Attorney General's office. If approved, the Office would oversee the state's voter fraud hotline, respond to complaints and conduct investigations into alleged violations of election law, and would report findings to the Attorney General for possible prosecution.
The agency would also provide a report to lawmakers annually, detailing the number of complaints received and investigations opened.
The sponsor, Rep. Patrick Flannery, an Olive Hill Republican, said of the bill: 'Hopefully, it will restore voter confidence and deter voter fraud.'
Of the bill, Flannery said: 'Mostly what it does is codify existing practice' in the AG's office, 'to make sure this whole process is process-dependent and not people dependent.'
The AG and other branches of government are already doing some investigations into election complaints, but the would would put all of those duties in the AG's office, Flannery said.
The bill would require additional funding to the Attorney General's office, Flannery said.
Leslie McCarty, Daviess county clerk, said the bill wouldn't be a change because those investigations are already being done on elections.
'It's still comforting to me that Kentucky has one of the safest and fairest election (systems), because we do have all of those things to protect against fraud,' McCarty said.
House Bill 684 contains a number of provisions, such as allowing county clerk's offices to have fewer election workers in counties with consolidated precinct plans; requiring more notice for school districts if a clerk's office plans to use school facilities as polling places on election day; and allowing caregivers of people who are voting in-person absentee due to age, disability or illness to also vote in-person absentee.
One change in the bill would prevent voters from using a credit card or debit card as an alternate form of identification when going to a polling place to vote.
The primary sponsor is Rep. Jennifer Decker, a Waddy Republican, but the credit card provision was added to the bill by Rep. Candy Massaroni, a Bardstown Republican.
Massaroni said county elections officials requested the change.
'They had people coming with just a credit card or a debit card with no ID on it, wanting to use it as proof of identification,' Massaroni said. 'I'm really not comfortable allowing financial institutions to determine if a person is eligible to vote with no photo identification. It's just too open to fraud.'
McCarty said it is uncommon for a person to try to vote using a credit or debit card as proof of identification.
'I would say 99.8% of our check-ins are with a state-issued ID,' McCarty said.
