Subject: Voting Rights
When ACORN, a community organizing anti-poverty group, was stripped of federal funds after (false) accusations of voter fraud were pushed on Congress by the Republican party, the "rule of ACORN" was born, championed by Bill O'Reilly and other hard-right ideologues.…
As a parent, I try to teach my children that “I told you so” is rude, and generally unhelpful in building relationships. But in the world of politics, policy, and advocacy, it’s often important to come back to a controversy…
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You can add Pennsylvania to the list of states to have a voter ID law shelved, at least for now. The decision came after the state's supreme court instructed a judge, who had upheld the state's voter ID law in…
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A three-judge panel blocked Texas's voter ID law today, stating the law would curb voter turnout and would foist "strict, unforgiving burdens on the poor." The ruling, according to The New York Times, "came just two days after another three-judge…
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I suppose post-election time is as good a time as any to talk about voting machine flaws, particularly following a decisive presidential election. But, just like falling gas prices in the short-term are no indication of an ebbing crisis, decisive…
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I arrived at my polling place this morning, not knowing what kind of scene to expect. After days of TV images of snaking lines, hours long, in early voting states, I brought plenty of reading material and excitement at maybe…
The Obama campaign headquarters were bustling five days before the election and two high school journalism students I brought there to report for their school paper were enthralled. They came from Little Village Lawndale High School in a mostly immigrant…
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Well, not so fast. After a report in The Washington Post last weekend indicated that the White House had requested that the Justice Department look into 200,000 names on the voter rolls that were in question, the DOJ has reportedly…
Halloween approaches and, as always, we’re found waiting for the Great Pumpkin, er, Election. Immediately following the broadcast Tuesday of the Peanuts classic that tells the story of the mythical Great Pumpkin that Linus van Pelt waits for year after…
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John McCain’s peculiar, over-the-top attacks on ACORN were initially a little hard to take seriously. Even when he kept on, it just left us asking, “Where is he going with this?” But when McCain slurred the grass-roots group during the…
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Here at Rooflines, we’ve been tracking recent reports from key swing states uncovering a coordinated GOP election strategy for suppressing votes of foreclosure victims. ACORN yesterday released a report that examines the facts and potential impact these challenges can have…
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In his post today on Rooflines, my colleague Matthew Hersh lays out the “What If” scenarios aswirl in the zeitgeist in the weeks leading up to the election. With the memories of the 2000 and 2004 elections still painfully fresh…
At the third and final presidential debate, when John McCain proclaimed that, Acorn, the darling target of conservative advocacy groups like FOXNews, could have committed voter registration fraud, he said the group “may be perpetrating one of the greatest frauds…
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Sounds scary, right? With the foreclosure crisis ushering over a million people into homelessness in the last two years, we’re seeing, again, political machinery go into high gear looking for capital at the expense of the folks who have lost…
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Following reports out of Michigan earlier this month as outlined on this Rooflines post that state Republicans there were planning to use a list of foreclosed homes to block people from voting in the upcoming election as part of an effort to challenge some voters on Election Day, the U.S. Department of Justice is now reportedly paying close attention to reports coming out of the the state that is lining up to be one of a handful of crucial swing states that could decide the outcome of the 2008 presidential election.
Wednesday’s edition of the Michigan Messenger, which broke the story earlier this month that a GOP county chair was planning to use a list of foreclosed homes to block people from voting this year
From the Messenger:
“If those allegations were true, it would be a concern to us in the Civil Rights Division,” Grace Chung Becker, the acting assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, told lawmakers at a joint hearing of the House Judiciary and Administration Committees on Wednesday.
Becker also informed lawmakers that criminal prosecutors from the Justice Department would not monitor polling stations.
At that same hearing, Republicans argued that fraud was the issue at hand, and not voter suppression. Election officials from Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia also discussed issues pertaining to having the right number of paper ballots, voting machines, and security.
This story needs the disinfectant power of sunshine, to paraphrase Justice Brandeis. Keep an eye on this one, as well as any irregularities in your voting district. more
National Housing Institute
