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Cleveland, OH - Elaine Tso, Interim Co-CEO of
Asian Services In Action, Inc. (ASIA, Inc.), testified today,
Thursday, April 25, in a field hearing before the U.S. House of
Representatives Subcommittee on Elections of the House
Administration Committee. The hearing was one of a series of field
hearings on voting rights and election administration. The
Subcommittee has held similar hearings in North Carolina, Georgia,
Texas and North Dakota.
Tso testified that barriers to voting have a disproportionate
impact on citizens who are immigrants and refugees, particularly
those with limited proficiency in English.
ASIA, Inc. has engaged in civic engagement work in immigrant
and refugee communities since 2012. That work has included
conducting programs that explain the American government and
elections to newly arrived immigrants and refugees, registering
citizens to vote and encouraging participation in the political
process. Tso based her testimony on that work, as well as ASIA,
Inc.’s general experience serving refugee and immigrant communities.
“The field hearings were an opportunity to shine a spotlight on the
particular challenges to voting that citizens who have arrived here
as refugees or immigrants face,” Tso said. “ASIA, Inc. supports
policies that open the electoral process to all citizens, including
those with limited English proficiency.
In her testimony, Tso discussed barriers to voting including
voter roll purging, difficulty registering and the general
underfunding of Ohio’s electoral system.
The hearing, which was held at the Cuyahoga Community
College, also featured Naila Awan of Demos, Mike Bricker of All
Voting Is Local, Daniel Ortiz of Policy Matters Ohio and Tom Roberts
of the Ohio Conference of the NAACP.
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