Native American Voting Rights Act

The Native American Voting Rights Act (NAVRA) seeks to protect voting rights for Indigenous communities who face unique and formidable challenges to fully participating in our democracy. Structural barriers such as navigating long travel distances, poor infrastructure, and lack of residential addresses impede access to voting-related services. Additionally, states and localities continue to enact voter restrictions which further interfere with the right to vote of Native communities.

The Native American Voting Rights Act would ensure equitable registration, early voting, and election day polling places on Native lands. It would provide accommodations for Native voters lacking residential addresses or at-home mail delivery, and it would require universal acceptance of tribal IDs.

In August 2021, Members of Congress introduced the Frank Harrison, Elizabeth Peratrovich, and Miguel Trujillo Native American Voting Rights Act of 2021, S. 2702 and H.R. 5008. The Leadership Conference joined a letter submitted to Congress by the Native American Rights Fund in support of these bills.

The Leadership Conference is a strong advocate of the Native American Voting Rights Act. Later in 2021, we supported the Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act that included the Freedom to Vote Act, the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, and the Native American Voting Rights Act. In January 2022, we submitted a letter to Congress in support of this comprehensive legislation and later that month, we sent a letter to Congress supporting a cloture vote on the Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act.

Together with the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and the Freedom to Vote Act, the Native American Voting Rights Act would ensure all of our communities have access to the ballot box and can fully participate in our democracy.


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