Americans abroad are very much engaged

Last night, one of my expat friends here pointed out to me just how engaged Americans abroad are in the political process back home.

For an American abroad to vote, that individual cannot simply rely on the Motor Voter Act to ensure that he or she is registered to vote each time they renew their driver’s licesne. Instead, a citizen wishing to exercise that most sacred of democratic rights, the right to vote, has to navigate the byzantine world of voter registration laws. In doing so, they can’t necessarily rely on fellow Americans abroad for help as each state, and indeed each county within a state can and unfortunately often do have widely divergent voter registraion and absentee ballot request rules and procedures. The Help America Vote Act helped eleviate some prolems, but too many obstacles remain that hinder or prevent the American diaspora — our de facto ambassadors to the world — from exercising thier most basic civic duty to vote.