settlement than in the entire previous two-year reporting period. let me give you some specific numbers. in the two-year reporting period before the lawsuit, 457 voter registration forms were submitted by the four affected rhode island social service agreement. in the second month, 1346 forms were received. in two months, a total of 1784. this is a total of 4171 new registered voters in the four months after the settlement as opposed to the two-year reporting period before the settlement. this illustrating the critical importance of section 7. i want to commend and thank the officials in rhode island for their cooperation throughout this case. we work very collaboratively to fix the problem rather than

fixing the blame, and i am very grateful for their collaborative efforts in this matter. i always say that the best policing is the policing that comes from within, and i would urge all of us to conduct these sorts of self-assessments on the nvra front to ensure that all of the covered agencies are indeed in full compliance. we had an interesting and productive meeting friday with the production directors. one of the observations that were made by at least two, and i forgot how many, by the election directors, was that they're starting to see more problems in departments of motor vehicles. so i wanted to share that feedback with you and would love to brainstorm with you on how to ensure that we are doing our level best to carry out the nvra's very important directives which we all have a shared interest in carrying out. let me -- we all have a shared interest again in ensuring that

our military and overseas voters can cast their ballots and do so in a timely fashion. the first cycle after a bill is passed is undeniably a challenging cycle because it's the first time something's gone into effect and i appreciate very much the efforts of everybody in this room in seeking to comply with the move act of 2010. i also appreciate the efforts of our dedicated career staff in the civil rights division, who spent remarkable amounts of time enforcing the move act. we have done a lot of outreach in the period since 2010 and many of you with special elections and early primaries this year have already heard from us in our survey work and the rest of you will be hearing from us as your primaries approach. since the enactment of the move

act, some states have moved their primary dates further out from the federal election date in federal election years to ensure that the ballots can be timely transmitted and we appreciate those efforts because that was obviously one of the biggest challenges we encountered. you may will have seen that we filed a motion for additional relief in our case against new york which had a late primary date and failed to get a number of thousands of ballots out on time in 2010 and then failed to move its primary date further out from the general election. just last friday, three days ago, the judge in that case issued an order moving the primary date to june 26th. following the 2010 election cycle we conducted a careful review of our nationwide experience. we had conversations with a host of stakeholders, including people on the hill, including people that are in this room and including people in the room on friday,and as a result, we have

prepared a package of legislation reforms that we would like to share with you. the train hasn't even remotely gotten ready to leave the station, and i tell you that so we can have that discussion not only today but in the weeks and months ahead to address the concerns that you may have. one of the most frequently heard concerns, both last year and in the months since my visit here a year ago, was the frustration that some of you in the room feel toward our civil rights division enforcement and the concern that i heard was that the d.o.j. civil rights division was trying to hold states accountable for misdeeds of local jurisdictions over which you feel that you have little or no control. i very much appreciate that concern. and at the same time i would respectfully call our attention

to the language of the statutes itself. because the move act and for that matter the nvra create responsibilities and they refer to states, states shall, states shall. and by comparison, section 203 refers to states or political subdivisions which is why our action is not against the state of california, it's against alameda county. so that is -- i very much appreciate the frustration that was expressed a year ago regarding situations where perhaps counties or cities or other subdivisions were remiss in some of their obligations. but it has been the department's long standing practice, under both republican and democratic administrations, under statute, the move act and nvra to hold states accountable in these statutory contexts. and this practice is based on the plain language of the

statute. i certainly look forward to continuing this conversation with you because i'm going to guess that the frustration has not abated, but i wanted to make sure that i -- i figured i would get one laugh line, but i wanted to proactively front and acknowledge those concerns and make sure that you know that we're very willing to engage in dialogue but recognizing that we start with the plain language of the congressional edicts and so i look forward to that conversation. i want to get to the question and answer part because that's always the -- for me, the most interesting and educational part of this, but let me spend a brief moment describe ourg election monitoring work because every year we send federal observers from the office of personnel management and management from the personnel office to monitor elections around the country throughout the election calendar. and these are elections for

federal, state, and local office. we had a big presence around the country in the 2010 election. overall in 2010 we monitored 56 elections in 45 jurisdictions in 19 states. the job of these observers is simply to monitor the elections. and they report back to d.o.j. supervisory attorneys and when when we encounter concerns we get in touch with you promptly to talk about them. and we'll continue to do that. that was a large data dump of what we have been up to. the upshot is we're as busy as we've ever been across a variety of fronts. i am very grateful to have the dedicated career professionals in the civil rights division and the voting section who are burning the candle at every which end. if you want to learn more about the cases we filed and the guidance that i mentioned to you, www.justice.gov/crt/voting.

all of those documents i referenced here are on the website. or you can just call us directly in the voting section or in the front office of the civil rights division. 514-2151. i would be happy to talk to you. i believe that we have so much in common, we have the shared interests in ensure that the access to the ballot for all qualified voters is indeed a right and a right that is in full force. and through our joint efforts, i think we can get there. so thank you for your time. i would love to entertain any questions you might have and i might get a glass of water before hand. thank you very much.

>> yes, sir. >> thank you. jason gant of south dakota. we have, you mentioned shannon county, an indian reservation in our state that of course we require preclearance on all of our registration and everything. but i want to make sure that i understand the election monitoring. i was elected in 2010 and i wasn't sure of how everything went down when your observers were in our state observing the election. i want to make sure that come the 2012 election should the department of justice should decide to, again, visit the great state of south dakota, i would welcome everyone to come visit south dakota, but you're going to be cooperating and and notifying my office as well as the local election officials

to make sure that everyone is on the same page on what activities you're going to be involved in so that should there be an issue that we became aware of that we may require your assistance or vice versa, that we have that line of communication open and effective come election day. >> i agree and i look forward to that. i asked christo come with me today because chris is the chief of voting capacity and among other things he oversees the election monitoring problem. chances are you might be getting a call from chris or from somebody else in the section. >> can i follow up on just that part? >> yes, sir. >> in that regard, when i spoke with chris before, but we have never gotten feedback for what you get when you go out. i mean you are -- you have been to mississippi many times and to many of the other states that you list here, but we never get a report as to what you find and what the issues are.

and i wondered if those would be available to us when you complete your investigation and why not. >> let me turn to chris so that you can hear directly from chris. >> mr. secretary, we will try to do better in that regard. we do try very hard to give feedback to local jurisdictions. after we have mentioned you, we'll try hard to loop your office in to let you know what we're seeing. >> one other followup before -- and chris, thank you for meeting with us when we were in washington, i appreciate it, it was very informative and we appreciate that. subsequent to our meeting, south carolina's voting -- was rejected and y'all wrote a letter indicating that -- salient points was the difference in minorities having driver's licenses and nonminorities have been driver's

licenses and the percentage was small, maybe 2% or something. as i recall looking at that letter, it appeared to me that was the only real statistic alda a that you based your later on. first, is that correct? and could you tell us how important the discrimination between a minority having driver's license and a nonminority having a driver's license, what weight that was given and -- because that was the only one really in your letter, objection letter. >> i can't get into the deliberations other than what is in the public record, because as you know, it remains a pending matter. the ---every particular submission is going to be fact specific and what is the lynch pin in any of these submissions is that the state has the burden

of proving or retrogressive effect. we did have what was noted in the letter pertaining to the issuance of driver's license aggregated by race. that was one issue, that we cited in there, but not the only issue that was cited. >> what would be from your viewpoint -- i know these are specific to each one, but what would be matters that you would consider critical? that was obviously one you felt strongly enough to put in the letter, which is public, but which other ones for those of our states who are trying to meet the section 5 requirements, what else would you consider to be important in the statistical information. >> well, again, we take a wholistic look at the process to determine whether the state has met its burden, the covered jurisdiction in this particular case voter identification would be it, met its burden in the absence of retrospective effect.

we will gather the entire legislative record to determine what were the contemporaneous statements that were made. i will direct you to the village of arlington heights, the supreme court decision that outlines the factors that are looked at when you're considering whether there's a potential issue of discriminatory intent and we will, again, as you have seen in the south carolina context, we will be looking at all the data that the state looked at in making its determination, and then we will apply the facts to the law in any given case. every case is different, every submission is different. that's why we take that very fact specific approach. >> i'll stop because there are 49 others here. but when we looked at that information, and we did have the

opportunity to go to afghanistan, along with the secretary of state from california, pennsylvania, florida, and indiana all went so we're very strong proponents of making sure that our military gets to vote. but that being said, we do not control the counties. and when you say the states are responsible, that's correct, and none of us are the state's leading official. the governor would be in that case. and where we have attempted to have working relationships with your organization in order to have problem counties do their work, it seems that we get blamed for that when, if you're going to hold the state specific, you should hold the governor specific or the individual counties, not those really people that are trying really hard to meet the act. and i can assure you that we have spent hours and untold days trying to make sure we meet the act. and when you have a county

fail, it's just as big to us. but when you come and hold the secretaries of state responsible for something they're not legal able to do and we don't represent the state. i would encourage you if you hold a state specific, you start with the governor. >> i appreciate that point and again, i also appreciate the situation and i noted the frustration from the plain language of the move act which says you're responsible and the frequent realities on the ground, i think there are something like 11,000 jurisdictions across the country, if you add them all up that administer the elections. and congress in its wisdom made the judgment about who was accountable. and we look forward to working with you and continuing to work with everyone around this table so that we have a little bit of luxury of time now. the move act was passed in '09d and we immediately had to pivot into implementation phase.

and now we have the benefit of that experience where we know, at least in part, where some of the particular problems occurred. concerned. we look forward to continuing the dialogue with you and your staff and anyone especially in this room so that we can hopefully prevent history from repeating itself to the extent that there were problems in a particular jurisdiction. >> we're running a little bit behind, but i know the secretary had a couple of questions. secretary kovac and secretary gardner, maybe we could take them ina order. >> this is chris kovac of kansas. i have a -- of course the department of justice preclearance decisions like all executive branch actions are bound by supreme court, and i don't want to get into your internal deliberations. but i'm curious how you get around this one sentence in crawford versus marion county

board of directives, 6-1 decision. he said, in this one sentence, for most voters who need them, the inconvenience of making a trip to the bureau of motor vehicles, gathering the required documents and posing for a punish surely does not impact the right to vote. so i'm just trying to assess the department's decision, how can a -- if the burden is not of constitutional significance as justice stevens has healed or the court has held, how can a particular difference in that burden among various racial categories be of legal significance under section 5 if the court has already ruled that this increased burden has no significance? >> we will be addressing that matter in the court proceedings. and as i said, each case is fact specific. under section 5, the burden rests with the state. to determine the absence of discriminatory purpose and the absence of discriminatory

effect. as you know, crawford was not a section 5 case. so we will undoubtedly have the conversation to which you are referring in court and i suspect that you and i may have an honest and respectful but pretty serious difference of opinion. yes, sir. >> puerto rico. since 1952, port ro ricco has had two districts. should we be considering moving to one-member strict or keep the who-member districts? >> that's a question for you and the governor and i have spent a fair amount of time with the governor on another matter unrelated to voting so i would not feel comfortable opining on what i think will be a decision for the residents of the commonwealth. >> okay. >> secretary garner? >> were there any locations that you monitored in the 2010 election that were selected by

random? >> by random? no. >> secretary mcdonough, do you have a quick question? >> yes, following up on exchanges, i understand the back and forth about the statute that holds the state responsible, have you all or the administration considered changing the statute to hold the responsible election of the response to election authority responsible on the move? >> i think that would be up to congress. and as you move forward, mr. secretary, whom i know pretty well from a prior life, you may want to consider that. >> what will the department and the administration think of it? >> i can't speak for the department now because that hasn't been floated. >> sure. >> i would simply note -- i'm reading from the testimony. the floor testimony on the bill. the move act is not -- this is a quote from the congressional

record. the move act does not intend to, in fact, take administrative control for military and overseas voting out of the hands of local officials, compliance remainses the state responsibility and states will continue to be the main entity against which the provisions of move in kabul will be enforced should the enforcement by the department of justice become necessary. >> and in fairness, too, for instance in maryland, the state took responsibility just for that activity, just to ensure, you know, we passed a law in the general assembly to avoid this, which is also an alternative, because everybody, i think, has got right on their side here. they want to enforce the law, we want to comply with the law, but it's the mechanics of it. and one way or another, if we talk about it and resolve the mechanics, it might make the issue go away. >> again, i look forward to further conversations with all of you on that issue because i do think it is a big issue and

we all have a shared interest in doing the right thing and we all have a job to do, and i think that's what can bring us together. yes, sir? >> quick question, we're trying to change our law in alaska to move our primary back, not because we can't make the deadline now, but we can't make the 45-day deadline if there is a challenge to a primary result. we may not be able to get it done this year, we'll see, but we don't have that many contestants in state wide races. i guess the question i v i'll be meeting with local election officials shortly. should we be -- i mean, is it your view that this law now prevents a jurisdiction to have a ten-day runoff after a close election and that sort of thing? how are you dealing with that? and how are you dealing with that? >> that is an issue that i believe they're talking about

the issue of runoff elections right now. they are preparing to address the issue of the applicability of the move act in a context like that. >> so right now the question is open? >> right. by the way, i should note that the move act, as you know, applies to federal elections. >> only federal elections. >> so that is a notable caveat. >> president chapman has made it very clear to me that the top priority is to try to run on time. we will do one more question. but i know he's a after sought after speaker and i'm sure will be available to us afterwards. >> if you would, it's our understanding that the department of justice has advanced amendments, could you give us your reasoning why it's necessary for you to advance those amendments and what the background is and why you are advancing them?

>> we're advancing them in short to take a page from the lessons of 2010. we're happy to share all of them with you. the process has hardly begun, and we any the amendments will make the enforcement of the move act that much better. and the reason we're sending them out now to everybody is that i suspect there will be viewpoint diversity and the best way to do it is not to wait until the 11th hour but to do it when the clock hasn't even started running yet so we can have that very open dialogue. and if you don't already have it, i will personally make sure that everybody in this room gets a copy of our proposals so that we can hopefully over the course and immediately set up a working group of sorts so we can get your feedback on what you like and don't like. i have never sent around a series of proposals that everyone liked 100%. i'd love to do that. and i suspect you have ideas that we haven't thought about.

that could make it better and i suspect we have ideas that you will like and we have some ideas that you will not like. so i would love to have that conversation. >> please join me in thanking assistant attorney general tom perez. >> thank you. >> quite obviously with a very closely watched presidential election upcoming, most of the chief elections officers will be working very closely with the major parties. we are pleased that will crosley, general council and director of voter protection at the dnc has come back to the afternoon session here to join us. as state officials, we're particularly interested in hearing about voter outreach and engagement efforts by the dnc. we will also have a representative from the rnc and we are especially interested in hearing his role and to hear

about his role in voter protection. >> i thank you, secretary miller, and thank you all for having us back this afternoon. as i did speak briefly this morning, i will endeavor to be fairly brief this afternoon as well. i do want to say that as we enter the 2012 election, we are facing new rules, many of which have been talked about here today, whether they involve photo id or voter registration, new rules happening in the states, many of these rules, we think the fact is that they will have a disproportionate affect

on members of the voting public, who traditionally have been disenfranchised. many of them minorities, either racial or language minorities. to that end, our focus and our goal, one of them anyway, is to ensure that we have an elaborate education program so that states -- in states across the country, voters are fully aware of what the new rules are, how they comply with them, and i was in fact very much encouraged earlier in the earlier session today hearing the secretaries talk about work that you have going on in your respective states, to ensure that voters are aware of what's happening

and able to comply. we hope that that will continue, and we hope that we will see notices going to voters who are likely to be affected. one of the ways that i know states have done this and can do this is to cross their dmv data bases, state id databases, with their voter registration databases and ensure that voters who may not have the ids that are recognized are noticed that need has now they have an opportunity to do that. let me also just address two other points. one is, i think that our elections by and large have improved. i think they have improved

procedurally, with the rules, but also with an increase or an improvement in the machine and technologies that we use to run our elections. i think there's also been improvement in participation rates. and certainly over the last half century or so, a significant improvement in participation rates. and certainly, we want those trends to continue. nonpartisan groups have found, as this is a nonpartisan group, have found that many of the laws being advanced or passed in many of your states are either unnecessary to secure the elections, or, as i mentioned earlier, will have a greater impact on some voters, lesser on others, an overwhelming impact