With the North Dakota Legislative session in full swing, the Student Senate has been looking at bills and resolutions it will support for the session.

In its first meeting of the new semester, senate approved three separate resolutions supporting different House and Senate measures.

In the meeting on Feb. 1, Student Senate approved two more resolutions to support other legislation.

The first was in support of North Dakota Senate Bill 2279, which adds sexual orientation to the protected class. This would mean the state could not discriminate based on sexual orientation.

“We’ve done this in the past,” resolution author Sen. Derek LaBrie said. “It’s something we’ve done consistently, and something we should continue to do.”

Sen. Leah Larson agreed.

“This has eliminated a lot of loopholes,” Larson said. “This is a pretty no-brainer bill and very well written.”

The passing of the resolution was followed by discussion

in support of Senate Bill 2330. That bill would require that student IDs have the birth date and residence information for the student.

With that information on the card, students would be able to use their IDs to vote in North Dakota.

Questions arose over whether or not all current students IDs would have to be replaced.

“It’s not stipulated, but my understanding would be all students would have to get a new ID,” LaBrie said.

Senators were concerned that the cost of getting all new IDs for students, as well as getting a new ID each time a student’s address changed would be too high.

But, a new House Bill is eliminating student voting certificates, which will make it harder for students to be able to vote in North Dakota.

“With this, we are being productive in our fight for students,” Sen. John Mitzel said. “There’s a great injustice being done to students. Dozens and dozens of students here and in Fargo were not able to vote (last voting season).

“This is not going to fix the problem entirely, but this is a great improvement to make sure their right is protected.”

The resolution was passed unanimously.

Megan Hoffman is a staff writer for The Dakota Student. She can be reached at [email protected].