Tuesday, February 7, 2012

South Carolina says in a lawsuit that the U.S. Justice Department was wrong to block the state from requiring voters to show government-issued photo identification to vote.

Attorney General Alan Wilson asks a judge to overturn the federal government decision in a lawsuit filed Tuesday.

The Justice Department in December rejected South Carolina's law requiring voters to show photo identification at the polls. The agency said the law didn't meet the burden under the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which outlawed discriminatory practices that prevented blacks from voting and requires South Carolina to get federal permission for every change to state election laws.

It was the first voter ID law to be refused by the federal agency in nearly 20 years.

Wilson says South Carolina's law doesn't discriminate against any voters.