We do in every state where a ID is required to vote.
Not free if you have to take a day of unpaid leave from work to go to that agency, or travel a great distance to get to their nearest office, or have to pay to get supporting documents (e.g., a certified copy of your birth certificate) to get the ID.
> In addition, voters may use the free voter identification card they received by mail from the County Election Board when they registered to vote. The law allows use of the voter identification card even though it does not include a photograph.
Michigan: https://www.michigan.gov/sos/elections/upcoming-election-inf...
> If you do not have photo ID, you can still cast a ballot simply by signing an affidavit
Wrong. Every American citizen has Social Security Card as well as Birth Certificate or Naturalization Certificate. If you make a law that diverts 20% of election funds (and PACs) towards Social Security Administration they can make Social Security Card into a proper ID. Added benefit would be reduction in identity theft.
Functioning democracy is not cheap. But if a poor county like India with population 5x of the US could manage the voter IDs, we have no excuse for dragging our feet.
We mostly use driver's licenses, and for people who don't drive states also offer IDs that look a lot like driver's licenses but are only for ID and are issued by the same agency that issues driver's licenses.
In many states they have closed many of the licensing offices, and cut back the hours licenses are issued at others. The closures happen disproportionately in poorer areas with a higher percentage of non-drivers. The reduced hours often leave office issuing licenses and IDs on weekdays in the middle of the day.
This can result in having to take a long trip on public transit to reach an office, and a long trip back, taking up much of your day. For many poor working people that can mean a day's wages lost.
The lost wages, transportation costs, and fees for the license or ID can come to over $100 which is a lot for many poorer people.
If we introduced an ID that is given to every citizen when they become old enough to vote, at no cost to them, and that can be obtained easily locally there would be little objection to requiring that to vote.
But most of the politicians pushing for voter ID are the ones that most benefit when poorer people cannot vote, and so tend to also be opposed to making the ID cheap and easy for eligible voters to obtain (and are also the ones closing license offices and reducing hours).