Every LEGAL Vote Should Count!

At the mid-July convention of the NAACP, President Kweisi Mfume drew attention to a “callous, deliberate and clearly unconstitutional effort to suppress” the black vote in Florida during the 2000 presidential election. He was correct, but probably didn’t realize he was describing the plight of African-Americans attempting to vote Republican.

In an project to research and verify claims of minority votes being disallowed during the 2000 Florida vote, John R. Lott Jr., and James K. Glassman, resident fellows at the American Enterprise Institute, found that black Republicans were victims of widespread discrimination. Writing in the Los Angeles Times, Lott and Glassman said: “The new finding show that African-American Republicans who voted in Florida were in excess of 50 times more likely than the average African-American to have had a ballot declared invalid...” They also found that... “Among white voters, Republicans were much more likely than Democrats to have spoiled ballots.” They further concluded that ...”the overall rate of spoiled ballots was 14 percent higher when the county election supervisor was a Democrat and 31 percent higher when the superior was an African-American Democrat.” This suggests that, in addition to suppressing military ballots, the Democrats attempted to disenfranchise Florida’s 22,270 registered minority Republican voters.

Elsewhere, columnist George Will writes that the night before the 2000 election, Democratic Rep. William Clay of Missouri told a Gore-Lieberman rally that a lawsuit would be filed to force the polls to stay open longer than Missouri law allowed. Such a suit was filed claiming that minorities were having trouble voting. The only problem was that the claimant had died in 1999. Nevertheless, a compliant judge ordered the polls to stay open, while a prerecorded telephone message from Jesse Jackson was already telling prospective voters that poll hours were extended. Were minorities actually having problems, or was it cover for moving groups of illegal or duplicate voters to different polling places? Missouri’s secretary of state says that among 1,384 ballots illegally cast, 62 belonged to felons, 79 were from vacant lot registrations, 86 voted twice, and 14 votes were in the names of dead persons. Of 1,268 applications for court ordered permission to vote, 1,233 were improperly granted to people who had never registered, but gave excuses that allowed them to vote. Did the above shenanigans tip the Missouri election?

Correspondingly, an investigation by the Republican National Committee has found evidence of duplicate voter registration and other voter fraud in 11 states where over 140,000 persons had been eligible to vote in at least 2 jurisdictions, according to the June 13th Washington Post. Of these, 689 persons were actually recorded as having cast ballots in two different places. The study was initiated when a December 2000 story in the New York Post reported that 14,000 voters in the state had dual registrations.

Those members of Congress who would like to make it more difficult for persons to vote illegally have been blocked by liberals. Anti-fraud provisions such as stringent review of voter rolls, and a requirement that mail registration include proof of identity are running into obstructions. “It’s just a much a violation of civil rights to have your vote diluted by an illegal vote as it is to have your vote denied,” said Senator Chris Bond of Missouri, who questions the practice of mail-in voter registration. Democrats, whose “motor-voter” law led to this lax form of registration, predictably disagree. It’s obvious that we need real election reform to include repeal of the “motor-voter” law and a clean up of election registration and administration. Tell your representatives and senators that you demand election reform that makes every LEGAL vote count.

illegal voting, but what have they done about it; especially now that a Republican is in charge of the Justice Department.

Good question. In Crook County I see no effort by the Illinois Republican Attorney General, nor US Attorney, nor party, to address the problem. Voter rolls in Crook County are such a mess it is impossible to know what is fraud and what is incompetence.

Recently in the elections office of the Crook County Clerk, the receptionist had a voter's registration up on the screen and changed the birth date of the voter. The voter was not present. She did not know the voter. She had no birth certificate, drivers license or other official document as a basis on which to make the change. There was no request from anyone anywhere to change that birth date. She did it all on her own for who knows what reason.

A husband and wife may register at the same time, same place (both at the drivers license facility, or both on Motor Voter cards I give them and hand deliver, or both at the library or village or towhsip hall). One name pops up as registered. One doesn't. Of those that pop up somewhere, they might be on the poll list, but not in the binder; Or have a wallet card but not be on the poll list or binder. Every possible combination of inconsistency exists. There is no rhyme or reason; no pattern. It is chaos.

When voters move they put down their old address so they can be stricken from the old address as well as added for the new address. Only sometimes is the old stricken. Sometimes due to divorce, going to college, etc only one person at an old address changes to a new address. But sometimes the County Clerk strikes all names from the old address.

Some people who vote twice must vote at the old address to protect the patronage job of their mother-in-law. For them it is not worth getting their mother-in-law fired if she might end up moving in with them or becoming a financial burden, not to mention the family fights.

Often, as a favor to the person who moved out, and so that the voter doesn't lose work and make the long trip back to the old neighborhood, the precinct captain will cast the vote of the voter who moved out. This is just another friendly service that the precinct captain provides to keep harmony in that family

We must understand is that people bending rules have good intentions. No harm, no foul.

Mudboy Slim, even more than the 68% obviously voted for Gore. In the exit polls, roughly 99% of voters registered with a particular party voted for that party's candidate; but the independent voters were divided about 50/50. Since 68% of the felons who voted were registered Democrats, it's reasonable to guess that about 10% were independent, and probably half of those (5%) voted for Gore as well.

It's also reasonable to infer that as a result of this deliberate refusal by local Democratic election officials to use the DBT system and screen out convicted felons, the margin of victory for Bush in Florida was reduced by about 3500 votes.

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