There are some who generally try to downplay voter fraud, saying either it does not exist or that it is too insignificant to worry over. There is much evidence to the contrary.

Consider the conclusion of a Milwaukee police Department study on voter fraud in 2004. There were something like 4600 more votes cast than the number of people listed as having voted. Numerous cases of voter fraud resulted in mixed results, largely because of the unreliability of records at the Milwukee Election Commission. "After nearly 18 months of investigation the Task Force believes that there was fraud committed in the 2004 Election, but as one investigator stated, 'I know I voted in the Election, but I can't be certain it counted.'" (see page 62 of report linked below)
Source- http://media2.620wtmj.com/breakingnews/ElectionResults_2004_VoterFraudIn...

There were some investigations into fraud in the 2008 election, and one officer, Mike Sanvick retired over these events, and the lack of prosecution. Upon retiring from the PD, he went to work for Assistant DA Landgraf, who complained that the Milwaukee Police Department sat on their hands in following up on information with regard to election fraud. From a Journal Sentinal article:

“Honestly, the Milwaukee Police Department largely ignored your double voter (and other) referrals received in January 2009 for the first six months of 2009,” Landgraf wrote in an e-mail to a city elections official on Jan. 26.
Speaking with unguarded candor, the veteran prosecutor said in his note that MPD’s tardy response had a major impact. The cases involve voters who may have cast more than one ballot, felons who may have voted illegally and other cases of possible election fraud.
I have it from eye witnesses known to me that there was massively and blatantly more fraud in the Milwaukee area in the 2008 elections than in the preceding presidential election. "

(references- http://www.jsonline.com/watchdog/noquarter/86776512.html and http://hotair.com/archives/2010/03/08/wisconsin-ag-charges-five-with-ele...)

One is led to speculate that the politcal inclinations of either the chief or his officers might be a factor in their lack of enthusiasm for investigating. So it could be that partisans complain there is a lack of successful prosecutions, when other partisans have done what they can in an official capacity, to make sure that there are not. To substantiate this, see this quote from the same article:

"In the e-mail, he [Landgraf] said Milwaukee officers may have become skittish after seeing how the police chief dealt with two cops who were part of the unit responsible for issuing a controversial report on voting problems in the 2004 election.

Flynn was outraged that he got their report just hours before its release in February 2008 and that the authors went beyond their role as cops by offering partisan policy proposals. The unsigned report was dismissed by Democrats but hailed by Republicans.

"I speculate that (Mike) Sandvick's banishment and the transfer of Mike Perez (ultimately to uniform duty) had a chilling effect on the 'rank and file' motivation to investigate these matters," the assistant district attorney wrote."

Still in the Milwaukee area, we have this from an AP article:
"An Oak Creek man has pleaded guilty to submitting 54 fake voter registrations in Milwaukee during the 2008 presidential election." How is 54 instances of fraud committed by ONE person insignificant? If one person is committing this type of fraud, it is reasonable to suspect there are a whole lot more. If only 10 people did this, that would be a potential of 540 votes, enough to swing a lot of very close races.

http://www.620wtmj.com/news/local/104093479.html

Speaking of close races, recall that Al Franken, after a lot of, let us say, irregularities, was declared the winner in his Minnesota race 4 years ago by a scant 312 votes. It was later discovered that at least 1099 convicted felons voted, and that at least 177 were convicted of illegally voting, with more cases pending. This is especially significant since according to Minnesota law, you have to know that you were breaking the law in order to be convicted. So this group of 177 had to admit both to voting and to knowing they broke the law.
source- http://washingtonexaminer.com/york-when-1099-felons-vote-in-race-won-by-...

Back to Milwaukee, consider these facts implicating State Senator Lena Taylor. She owns a house, zoned for 8 people. There are 36 registered voters at that address, 20 of whom voted in a recent election. In addition, there were 7 same day registrants at that address vouched for by Ms. Taylor's mother. Something does not smell right here. Either zoning laws are being broken, or voter fraud is being committed, or both. I have yet to hear of any legal complaints against Taylor or her mother involving this set of facts.
http://mediatrackers.org/2011/11/22/exclusive-lena-taylor-property-acces...

And again from Milwaukee there is this:
"Clarence S. Haynes, along with two other SEIU organizers, were uncovered by Media Trackers in October 2011 after they registered to vote for the contentious April 5, 2011 election using out-of-state ID’s and claiming residence at a Glendale hotel.

Following the Media Trackers story, the Milwaukee District Attorney’s office undertook an investigation, subpoenaing hotel records from the Glendale Residence Inn on November 4, 2011. The subpoena order and affidavit of Assistant District Attorney Bruce Landgraf indicate that the subpoenaed documents are believed to “constitute evidence of Election Law crimes in violation of 12.13 (1), Wis. Stats.” 12.13 (1) of the Wisconsin Statutes details the qualifications for voting in Wisconsin." Source-http://mediatrackers.org/2012/07/16/exclusive-seiu-subpoenaed-in-milwaukee-vote-fraud-investigation/

Note that Haynes is an organizer for the union. One wonders if he registered in other states with no intent to establish residency, as he did in Wisconsin. Further one is left to wonder how many people he inspired, in his role as organizer, to commit the same kind of frauds?

True the Vote is an organization that started in Texas due to a huge number of irregularities witnessed. According to a Fox News article:

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/09/23/voter-fraud-houston-tea-party

“The first thing we started to do was look at houses with more than six voters in them" Engelbrecht said, because those houses were the most likely to have fraudulent registrations attached to them. "Most voting districts had 1,800 if they were Republican and 2,400 of these houses if they were Democratic . . .

"But we came across one with 24,000, and that was where we started looking."

It was Houston's poorest and predominantly black district, which has led some to accuse the group of targeting poor black areas. But Engelbrecht rejects that, saying, "It had nothing to do with politics. It was just the numbers.”

The task was overwhelming. With 1.9 million voters and 886 voting precincts, Houston’s Harris County is the second largest county in the country -- and the key to Texas elections. (snip)

Their work paid off. Two weeks ago the Harris County voter registrar took their work and the findings of his own investigation and handed them over to both the Texas secretary of state’s office and the Harris County district attorney.

Most of the findings focused on a group called Houston Votes, a voter registration group headed by Sean Caddle, who also worked for the Service Employees International Union before coming to Houston. Among the findings were that only 1,793 of the 25,000 registrations the group submitted appeared to be valid."

Since those early days, True the Vote has gone nationwide. In a recent article they report this:

"True The Vote found more than 19,000 Ohio voters claiming Florida mailing addresses, according to state records. More than 6,390 people hold registrations in both states. True The Vote identified 534 individuals allegedly casting ballots in both Ohio and Florida. Today 34 cases were turned over to federal and state authorities."
from this link-http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/49955

I could go on and on and on and on, but by now, hopefully you get the picture. There is considerable evidence that voter fraud not only is being committed, but that there is an organized effort toward that end. Given the difficulty in proving voter fraud, I suspect that even the comprehensive list of cases and evidence that exists is but the tip of the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Without proof of identity at the polls, fraud is easily committed, and very difficult to detect. Remember that one fraudulent vote requires one honest vote to cancel, and another honest vote to re-establish what should have been the legitimate margin.

Arguments that voters are being suppressed, that students and minorities will be disadvantaged simply do not hold water. These arguments presume that students and minorities MUST wait until the last minute to register, that they are too stupid or too lazy to take care of registering until it is time to vote. The very people who claim to be protecting these classes of voters are by their arguments insulting the people they claim to protect, and are making racist implications themselves. In this democratic republic, vote integrity is very important if we are to have fair and honest elections, and fair and honest government. By making sure that those who vote are legally entitled by having valid identification to verify their identity seems a small and simple step in the direction of vote integrity.