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xchrom

(108,903 posts) Sat Aug 17, 2013, 09:07 AM Aug 2013

Here's Where Rand Paul Can Find 'Objective Evidence' of Vote Suppression

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/08/heres-where-rand-paul-can-find-objective-evidence-of-vote-suppression/278728/

Dear Senator Rand Paul:

If you want to be president of the United States one day, if you want more people to take you seriously as an independent thinker within the Republican Party, if you want to lead your party back to control of the Senate, or if more modestly you want simply to tether yourself to some form of reality, you are going to have to stop making false and insulting statements like you did Wednesday when you declared: "I don't think there is objective evidence that we're precluding African-Americans from voting any longer."

I guess it all depends upon your definition of "objective evidence." On the one hand, there are the factual findings about evidence and testimony contained in numerous opinions issued recently by federal judges, both Republican and Democrat, who have identified racially discriminatory voting measures. And on the other hand, there is your statement that none of this is "objective." It's a heavy burden you've given yourself, Senator -- proving that something doesn't exist when we all can see with our own eyes that it does.

Last August, for example, three federal judges struck down Texas's photo identification law under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act because it would have led "to a regression in the position of racial minorities with respect to their effective exercise of the electoral franchise." Those judges did find that some of the evidence presented to them was "invalid, irrelevant or unreliable" -- but that was the evidence Texas offered in support of its discriminatory law. You should read this ruling before you talk about minorities and voting rights.

While you are at it, you should also read the opinion -- issued almost exactly one year ago -- by another panel of federal judges who determined that Florida's partisan plan to shorten early voting days constituted evidence of racial discrimination. Or if that doesn't rise to your level of "objective evidence" read what U.S. District Judge John D. Bates, an appointee of President George W. Bush, wrote last fall in a voting-rights challenge in South Carolina. Section 5 of the federal law, he wrote, acted as a vital deterrent forcing recalcitrant lawmakers to enact less discriminatory voting measures.