“Voter Fraud” Prevention Equals

Voter Suppression

The radiance of election success.
Comandante Agi Rights

Michael Collins
First Published in
“Scoop” Independent News
Washington, D.C.

There’s a new clue to the motivation behind the recent firing of federal prosecutors. Reporters Gordon, Talev and Taylor of McClatchy Newspapers established a likely relationship between the post 2000 hard right turn in civil rights policies at the Department of Justice and the promotion of the new cadre of right wing U.S. Attorneys who support restricting voter eligibility. Karl Rove’s own words on the subject indicate a further connection between recent appointments in nine states where very tight Congressional races were anticipated

The Bush Justice Department is imploding after years of consistently undermining the rights and freedoms of those citizens it claims to serve. From the Patriot Act to the unfettered sadism endorsed at White House inspired and sponsored torture centers around the world, the Justice Department stands with the White House. It provides a fig leaf of legal justification for the various adventures which involve war, death a suffering.

Politicians and officials are taking cover from the dangerous debris of the fired federal prosecutor’s scandal. The legislative craftsman who allowed Bush to perform the previously barred dismissals, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA), is now openly critical of the firings. The Democrats on Capitol Hill are uniquely focused in their demands that Gonzales go. Even Cong. Tom Tancredo (R-CO), a rabid right wing opponent of immigration, called on Bush to fire Gonzales.

The “Scoop” Independent News analysis of March 12, 2007 suggested that one prime motivation behind the abrupt firing of at least four of the eight U.S. attorneys was their failure to cooperate on election fraud related issues. In the case of two, it was a failure to pursue indictments requested by prominent state Republicans in New Mexico and Washington State. It seems the U.S. Attorneys in Nevada and San Diego went too far in their investigations of sitting Republican office holders. Fired U.S. Attorney Daniel Bogden had the FBI looking into problems with Nevada’s must-win candidate for governor, Republican Jim Gibbons (who won). San Diego based U.S. Attorney Carol Lam put former Republican Cong. “Duke” Cunningham in jail and was investigating another Californian, Cong. Jerry Lewis (R-CA).

New evidence and revelations are flooding the media since March 12th. It suggests a coordinated effort to use the “voter fraud” anomaly as a key vehicle to promote the very real phenomenon of voter suppression. There have been 24 convictions in three years of focused investigation, hence the term anomaly rather than problem.

Election Fraud versus Voter Fraud

Lorraine C. Minnite, PhD of Barnard College, Columbia University just published a major article explaining voter fraud. Here distinctions between voter and election fraud are critical:

Voter fraud is the “intentional corruption of the electoral process by the voter.” This definition covers knowingly and willingly giving false information to establish voter eligibility, and knowingly and willingly voting illegally or participating in a conspiracy to encourage illegal voting by others. All other forms of corruption of the electoral process and corruption committed by elected or election officials, candidates, party organizations, advocacy groups or campaign workers fall under the wider definition of election fraud.

Voter fraud is the retail while election fraud is the wholesale corruption of elections.

Florida 2000 provides an excellent example of documented election fraud.. At least 50 thousand eligible, registered voters were removed from the voting rolls before the election by Katherine Harris, Florida’s Secretary of State under Jeb Bush. These voters were almost all black Floridians. During the election, nearly 100 thousand “spoiled” (supposedly uncountable) ballots were disqualified in Florida, most of which in precincts with predominantly black populations. The blatant voter suppression by Harris was acknowledged by the state of Florida in a 2002 consent decree it reached with the NAACP. Florida 2000 election fraud cost Al Gore the election by removing thousands of voters who would have chosen him by overwhelming margins.

Ohio’s 2004 election was the scene of number of well documented charges of election fraud. These included the old standby voter suppression and the new variation, vote switching. One recent analysis demonstrated exactly how this new scheme works by studying precincts with over 160 thousand punch card ballots. In addition to direct examination of ballots, high level statistical analysis shows the wholesale shift of votes to Bush. As a result, he took the presidency again since Ohio was the deciding state.

 1  |  2  |  3