Felon Disenfranchisement
The practice of stripping voting rights from people with criminal convictions, its scale, and the global debate over restoring rights.
The American Exception
The United States disenfranchises more citizens for criminal convictions than any other democracy. As of 2024, an estimated 4 to 4.6 million Americans cannot vote due to felony convictions, including over a million who have completed their sentences entirely. Laws vary sharply by state: Maine, Vermont, and the District of Columbia allow people to vote even while incarcerated, while several states permanently disenfranchise at least some people with felony convictions unless they receive individual clemency.
The racial impact is staggering. Roughly one in 16 Black Americans of voting age is disenfranchised, compared to about one in 59 of the overall population. In some states, more than 20 percent of Black adults are barred from voting. These disparities reflect the interaction of felon disenfranchisement with racial disparities in the criminal justice system, where Black Americans are incarcerated at several times the rate of white Americans.
