The 36-page bill was described to TPM as a greatest-hits list of GOP-proffered restrictive voting measures, taking particular aim at mail-in voting. It would chop Iowa’s early voting window from 29 days to 18, leaving hardly any time for absentee ballots to be received, filled out and sent back, especially if recent nationwide postal delays continue. It severely limits who can deliver an absentee ballot on someone’s behalf, a seeming attempt to stop volunteers from stepping in to get them returned quickly. It also only gives Iowans 70 days before the election to request an absentee ballot, down from the 120 days currently enshrined in the law.
“Iowa Republicans are in the running for introducing the worst anti-voting bill,” the Democratic voting rights lawyer Marc Elias
tweeted recently. “It’s a race to the shameful bottom.”