NH UnionLeader: GOP lawyer: Same-day signup invites fraud

[NewHampshireDem]

http://www.theunionleader.com/articles_showa.html?article=46722

The Secretary of State’s office will send letters out tomorrow to voter registration officials across New Hampshire, asking how many people registered to vote on Election Day without being able to prove they actually live here or have American citizenship.

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Critics say the system is too vulnerable to deceit, allowing someone who wants to participate in an election fraudulently to do so. Even if the person is later caught and prosecuted, they correctly point out, his vote still counts.

<snip>

This year it was Republican lawyers who contacted the Attorney General’s office with Election Day allegations that college students from Massachusetts were en route to Hanover to register to vote.

An attorney from the AG’s office was at the Hanover polling station on Tuesday, and “did not observe anything consistent with that during the day,” according to Fitch.

Indeed, Jim Merrill, legal counsel for the New Hampshire Republican Party, who reported the concerns to Fitch on Tuesday, told the Sunday News on Friday that he has no proof that such a thing actually occurred. But he said he still has concerns that New Hampshire’s system is ripe for fraud, because of the domicile affidavits voters are allowed to sign.

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I expect there's probably going to be a lot of this going on in this state for the next four years. They can't get over the fact that the face of NH is changing for the better.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

1. Obfuscation.

Obscuring the more salient issues behing a wall of manure.

[maxanne]

2. how typical

of the Republican Party. Their scare tactics against college students were exposed - so now they're going to try this.

In Bartlett, NH - a couple of women I met were told that they couldn't register to vote unless they registered a car.

Bud Fitch isn't going to like the results of this. The Secretary of State's office actually changed their website (the college student voting portion) because there was so much publicity about how intimidating it was.

The Republican Party in NH is trying desperately to keep their stranglehold on the state.

[MAlibdem]

3. Why were they in Hanover, you ask?

Because they were there to watch the republican party disenfrachise me, a Dartmouth College student. Assholes.

[maxanne]

4. what happened

MAlibdem? Were you challenged at the polls? I work for a nonprofit that is going to be working on election reform in NH, and the more stories I hear the better.

[FightinNewDem]

5. Here's the real irony

The current system is entirely the fsult of the same good-ol-boy Republicans who are now pissing and moaning about it.

When the time came for NH to adopt the provisions of the federal "motor voter" law, the town clerks and checklist registrars in many small towns (ie, GOP hotbeds) screamed bloody murder, upset that the town librarian might infringe upon their turf by signing up new voters. As a result, NH (and a few other states) were granted a conditional exception, where they didn't have to allow full-fledged motor voter registration so long as they allowed same-day registration.

Now, I have some misgivings about same-day registration; I live in Manchester, and voter fraud by both parties is almost a sport here. But if the Ethels and Myrtles in the town clerk's offices around the state are going to stonewall, then tough cookies, we need some way to allow folks to register.

[maxanne]

6. pissing and moaning

<<<The current system is entirely the fsult of the same good-ol-boy Republicans who are now pissing and moaning about it.>>>

Amen. I can't wait to point that out in my editorial next week.