Utility bills and leases are often used to get the IDS which are privately issued as well. College IDs provide a proof of residence, in the same way utility bills do. There's no good reason to deny College IDs, but there are plenty of bad ones.
The purpose of the ID check isn't to establish proof of residency. (Passports and military IDs, for example, in no way establish residency.) The point is to establish citizenship, which all IDs issued by the TX DPS (DLs, state IDs, voter ID cards, and LTCs) do via a standardized mechanism, but student IDs do not.
The purpose of the ID check is to provide visual identification - it's a photo ID that is required, not a proof of citizenship nor proof of residency. The time to check for citizenship is when the voter registers, not at the polling location when already registered voters are trying to cast their ballot. Student IDs can serve as a visual identification just as well as a driver's license.
The time to check for citizenship is when the voter registers
But that isn't currently done, and it would just mean the same complications, but at registration time instead. So you'd need to provide ID twice (when you register, proving citizenship), and then (possibly different) ID again when you vote. That's not any better and arguably worse than Texas' desired solution which requires you to provide ID only at voting time.
Generally I agree on all things making it easier for ALL people to vote. However the other side might be right about college IDs. Many students are from out of state. Maybe things have changed since I went to school in the 80's but my college IDs said nothing of my home address or where I was a citizen.
I was (and am) a citizen of Illinois. I went to school in Iowa for two years then transferred closer to home, but in Missouri - still an "out of state" student.
I really think you're jumping to conclusions. There's over 100 public colleges in Texas and no centralized database that the state government has on these IDs, causing a lot of toil for poll workers to ensure the ID checks out. Plus, the only authentication tends to be either a social security number or student ID number on the magnetic stripe that could easily be faked with a $100 magstripe reader.
Voter suppression is awful and indefensible, but isn't a gun license state issued while a college ID has no real weight and no guarantee of validity when it's from a private institution?
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u/jeffmooo Dec 13 '17
Gun licenses are accepted over college IDs as well in Texas.
Source: http://progresstexas.org/blog/stricken-texas-voter-id-law-allowed-gun-licenses-not-student-id