The Department of Transportation on Tuesday launched an official investigation on Alabama, where 34 DMVs announced they would either limit their services or close completely. This comes one year after Alabama chose to pass strict voter ID laws that require photo ID to register to vote, a law that has left about 250,000 Alabama citizens lacking the proper ID for voter registration.
Of Alabama’s 10 counties with the highest non-white voter population, eight will be closed. And more than half of the counties that voted for President Barack Obama’s second term will lose their DMVs. Alabama’s population is 26.7 percent Black, and 27.3 percent of the state’s registered voters are Black.
Ala. Governor Robert Bentley issued a statement Wednesday denying that any of the closures are politically motivated, saying that “opportunistic politicians such as Hillary Clinton have politicized an Alabama budgeting issue, going so far as to travel to our own state for the sake of political pandering.”
