The state legislature is looking at whether to undo New Hampshire’s ban on “ballot selfies” – photos taken of completed ballots in the polling place – after courts have overturned the law, but the attorney general’s office may still try to take the issue to the U.S. Supreme Court, reports the Nashua Telegraph.
The argument in favor of allowing ballot selfies is pretty obvious – freedom of expression, what’s the harm, it’s my ballot, etc. – but the argument against them is more subtle. Basically, opponents say that allowing photo confirmation of a person’s vote will enable election coercion and bribery: people trying to get you to support their candidate/issue have no way of confirming whether you actually supported it in the ballot booth, but that changes if they can demand to see a selfie of your ballot before deciding whether to bribe you or beat you up. This same argument is why many states, including New Hampshire, have long had laws forbidding people from marking ballots in a way that votes can be confirmed after the fact.
One way around this is to fake a ballot selfie – which is why I made a semi-tongue-in-cheek explainer on how to do just that: You can watch it here.
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