Arizonas Guardianship Law Is a Voting Rights Nightmare Mother Jones [Video]

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When Becky King’s daughter Beth Papp turned 18, she couldn’t register to vote in her home state of Arizona. Five years later, she still can’t.

Papp is autistic and nonspeaking; when she was in her teenage years, King was advised that placing her daughter under full legal guardianship, a process she applied for when Papp was 17, was the right thing to do. Various frameworks for guardianship, or conservatorship, exist in all 50 states—in all cases stripping both minors and adults of a variety of rights then granted to a third party.

“Nobody told me specifically what the implications would be,” King said. “It didn’t even occur to me that anything else would be an option.” 

King was far from the only parent to receive such guidance. Sey In, a staff attorney for Disability Rights Arizona, calls it the “school …