Rare Town Where Voters Don’t Have to Be Citizens

More than a decade ago, this left-leaning suburb’s decision to allow noncitizens to vote made news across the country. Today the fact that noncitizens here can vote is news to many residents.

“Is that true?” said Israel Martinez, who moved seven years ago to this leafy suburb just across the District of Columbia line. “Really?”

In 1992, the City Council amended the city charter to allow immigrants -- regardless of documentation -- to vote in municipal elections. Of the six Maryland communities where U.S. citizenship is not a requirement for voting, Takoma Park, with more than 17,000 residents, is the largest.

A similar proposal, limited to school board elections, was approved by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors on Tuesday night. It is to go before voters this fall.

The Takoma Park City Council made its decision after a well-organized campaign, a lengthy and heated public debate about citizenship and the dangers of voter fraud, a nonbinding resolution and threat of legal challenges. Now, residents and experts who have studied Takoma Park’s voting experiment say the effect has been underwhelming.

“The sky didn’t fall. You haven’t had a huge influx of immigrants moving to take part in elections. You haven’t had voter fraud. Nothing happened,” said Lisa Garcia Bedolla, who teaches political science at UC Irvine and has studied immigrant voting initiatives.

“I think the major impact of the noncitizen voting change has been to transmit the message that Takoma Park is welcoming to people who are not U.S. citizens,” said Mayor Kathy Porter. “In terms of practical effect, I don’t think there’s been any election where a huge number of noncitizens have voted.”

In November 2003, 14 of the city’s 494 registered noncitizens voted in the local elections. Voter participation for noncitizens matched those of citizens in the elections just after the charter was amended, but the statistics declined over the years.

“In one sense, the results have been kind of disappointing for some of those who advocated for the change,” said Ronald Hayduk, assistant professor of political science at Borough of Manhattan Community College in New York and immigrant voting rights supporter. “Over time there’s just been a lot less education and mobilization.”

Porter said her city had made an effort to reach out to its foreign-born residents, who make up nearly one-third of the population here, according to the 2000 census. Organizers went door-to-door, speaking to residents in their native languages, and the city hosted informational meetings about the voting laws.

Although the notion of immigrants casting ballots sparks controversy today, at several points in U.S. history citizenship and enfranchisement were not so closely linked.

In the 19th century, Congress allowed several Western states to offer suffrage to immigrants as a way to entice them to move to the territories, said Garcia Bedolla. Suffrage was withdrawn in a wave of anti-immigrant sentiment around the start of the 20th century. By 1928, the vote was limited to U.S. citizens in federal and state elections.

Maryland’s constitution, however, does not require U.S. citizenship for local elections, which is why communities like Takoma Park and the village of Barnesville (population 161) can legally allow noncitizens to vote.

“We’ve just never had a citizenship requirement,” said Barnesville Mayor Peter T. Menke. “I’ve heard the pundits on TV and the talk shows blasting all of us, and I get very infuriated. I have different feeling about a statewide or national election, but in a local election where you’re directly involved and you’re a taxpayer, it’s different. I have no problem with anybody who’s interested in the town and wants to cast a ballot.”

Residents in Takoma Park said they felt the same way.

“This is were you live, this is where you spend your money,” said Duwa Mutharika, a Zimbabwe native who had lived in Takoma Park for four months.

Mutharika, like several noncitizens here, was not aware that she could vote. When told that she could, she responded enthusiastically, “When you are here, you have a responsibility to be part of the community.”

Demographics play a part in the low turnout rate for noncitizen voters in Takoma Park, said Garcia Bedolla. “Most of the immigrants are poorer and less educate,” she said. “So even if you give them voting rights, you’re not going to have hundreds of thousands of immigrants pouring into the polls.”