Bush Government to Poor Voters: We Don't Want You to Vote

[madmusic]

The Justice Department is pressuring 10 states to purge their voter rolls, while states are ignoring laws to help low-income Americans register to vote.

State welfare offices across the country are not offering millions of low-income Americans the opportunity to register to vote when applying for public assistance despite a federal law requiring them to do so, according to an analysis of a recent federal voting registration report and experts who say the Department of Justice and states are to blame.

"It's huge. It's another area where the administration is failing us," said Donna Brazile, chair of the Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute, speaking of the Department of Justice's oversight of the nation's voter registration laws. "They are not pushing states to recognize their voter registration responsibilities."

At the same time, the Justice Department's Voting Section, which enforces voting rights and supervises elections in some states, is pressuring 10 states to do more to purge voter rolls -- or remove ineligible voters -- before the 2008 presidential election, according to letters sent to state election officials this spring.

http://www.alternet.org/story/56957/

The article is from July 17, 2007. Anyone know how successful this is for the GOP?

[jwirr]

1. Long ago in what seems like another world various states were

refusing to allow black voters to register. We dealt with that by sending volunteers to those states to help register those who want to vote. Three valiant young men died doing just that. If this kind of stuff is happening again maybe we need to follow the example set by those three young men. We need to do what it takes to see that Florida 2000 does not happen again. What are the 10 sates?

[madmusic]

2. but did not list the recipients

Cynthia Magnuson, a Justice Department spokeswoman, confirmed in an e-mail that similar letters had been sent to 10 states, but did not list the recipients.

Any bets on if it is the populous Democratic state. The blues ones.

Here's the kicker.

"A just-released federal voter registration report reveals the stakes. In late June, the Election Assistance Commission issued a biennial voter registration report to Congress for 2005 and 2006. The report found that 16.6 million new registration applications were received by state motor vehicles agencies while only 527,752 applications came from state public assistance offices -- a 50 percent drop from 2003-2004. The report also found 13.0 million voters were purged nationwide and 9.9 million were put on "inactive" status, meaning these people have to provide identification before receiving a 2008 ballot."

That's enough to steal the election.