May I see your papers, citizen?

@Brandon9000,

Quote:

Despite the public sparring between the DOJ and Florida officials, most county election officials had already opted not to continue with the process, which they are able to do given the guidelines of the state process.

Most election officials had seen the issues with the process and stopped it because of those issues. But it seems Brandon and David are more interested in the smoke screen than the reality.

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@Brandon9000,

CBS wrote:

Hinkle ruled that federal laws are designed to block states from removing eligible voters close to an election. He said they are not designed to stop states from blocking voters who should have never been allowed to cast ballots in the first place.

That's not something Hinkle ruled, that's a legal premise everyone agrees on. But Florida's purge did remove eligible voters close to an election. How did Hinkle rule that this was acceptable, or at least less unacceptable than the alternative? That's the interesting part of the decision, but CBS says nothing about it. Evidently their reporter only read its first page before publishing.

Has anyone found a link to the original text of decision? I have tried for 20 minutes, but nothing so far.

1 Reply

@Thomas,

No written decision at this point.

Quote:

Hinkle in ruling from the bench said federal laws...

A U.S. Department of Justice official said that the department would review the written decision when it was issued and declined to say whether federal authorities planned to appeal the ruling.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/06/27/judge-refuses-to-block-florida-voter-purge/#ixzz1z5xkMQ8y

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@parados,

parados wrote:

No, the voter purge was clearly removing people that ARE US citizens from the rolls. That IS illegal to do under the voting rights act.

I don't know if citizens were or were not being removed, but hypothetically, if that did happen, it would be a defect with the execution, not the intention. The people have a legitimate right to disqualify non-citizens from voting, and therefore have a legitimate right to try to do so.

4 Replies

@Brandon9000,

Quote:

I don't know if citizens were or were not being removed, but hypothetically, if that did happen, it would be a defect with the execution, not the intention

Snort

Cycloptichorn

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@Brandon9000,

So far every person challenged as been a US citizen. This program has not identified any illegal voters according to reports I've seen from Florida. Moreover, the program makes an assumption of guilt and demands the citizen prove his innocence and the proof is not trivial. How is that not against the Voting Rights Act?

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@Brandon9000,

Brandon9000 wrote:

I don't know if citizens were or were not being removed,

Oh really? Just a few posts ago, you confidently proclaimed: "So the Obama federal government secretly hopes that illegals will be able to vote. Just great." In effect, you accused the Department of Justice of wrongful persecution. Before doing that, don't you think it's your responsibility to actually know that no citizens were being removed?

1 Reply

@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

Brandon9000 wrote:
I don't know if citizens were or were not being removed,

Oh really? Just a few posts ago, you confidently proclaimed: "So the Obama federal government secretly hopes that illegals will be able to vote. Just great." In effect, you accused the Department of Justice of wrongful persecution. Before doing that, don't you think it's your responsibility to actually know that no citizens were being removed?

No, because this is the first time I've become aware that there is an issue with citizens being wrongfully removed. It never occurred to me that this was an issue, and the article in question didn't raise the issue. I do not support removing actual citizens from the voter rolls, but I believe that there are non-citizens attempting to vote. Whatever measures are taken to protect citizens from harassment or wrongful removal cannot amount to utterly forfeiting the right to remove non-citizens. There must be some way to accomplish the removal of non-citizens without harming innocent people. Obviously, no law is ever enforced without some error. If there is a pattern of errors or persecution it should be stopped, but I absolutely support preventing actual illegal aliens from voting. I am wondering if some fraction of the people raising the issue of wrongful removal of citizens aren't doing so as a smokescreen to mask their desire that illegal aliens be allowed to vote.

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@Brandon9000,

If the government has evidence that someone is illegally voting then yes, they should be removed. The issue here is that Florida just invented a screen like crossing voter roles with drivers licenses and those that don't fit have to prove their right to vote. That's ridiculous. If they want to use that screen as a start for their investigations, then fine but the burden is on the state, not on the voter. Given that they have yet to find the fraudulent voter population, I think they are barking up the wrong tree.

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@Brandon9000,

Quote:

I don't know if citizens were or were not being removed, but hypothetically, if that did happen, it would be a defect with the execution, not the intention.

Brandon you are really missing the key point.

The intent of these bills is precisely to prevent citizens (that is college students, the elderly poor people, Black people and Latinos) from voting.

The goal is to help Republicans win elections. If you make it harder for people to vote, white wealthy people will vote more and poor minorities will vote less. The result is obviously good for Republicans.

This is why they are pushing this so hard in spite of the fact there is no evidence of any problem with non-citizens voting.

2 Replies

@maxdancona,

Quote:

Brandon you are really missing the key point.

Tell us something we don't know, Max.

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@Brandon9000,

Brandon9000 wrote:

I believe that there are non-citizens attempting to vote.

Why should we care if you "believe" it? There is no actual evidence that this is anything more than a boogie man used to scare people into passing laws that make it hard for poor people to vote.

There is no demonstrated harm from non-eligible people voting.

There is demonstrated harm from passing laws that create a gauntlet for eligible voters. (Assuming you actually care about Democracy.)

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The New Face of Jim Crow: Voter Suppression in America

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The citizens have a legitimate right to keep non-citizens from voting and it cannot be impossible to enforce. You cannot win the argument that any law whatever designed to keep illegals from voting must of necessity be unfair. You also cannot use the standard that if a law can ever mistakenly accuse an innocent person, then it is unacceptable, because every law can mistakenly accuse an innocent person. Any law which frequently accuses innocent people is unacceptable. I agree with that, however the people simply do have the right to see their laws enforced. You can criticize some particular example of a law, but you cannot win the argument that any law which attempts to filter out non-citizens from voting must of necessity be unfair.

4 Replies

@Brandon9000,

Brandon you are really missing the key point.

But hey, what's new about that.

0 Replies

@Brandon9000,

When you have almost no evidence of voter fraud but huge evidence of voter suppression, it is logical to assume that something is going on, to not assume such is to bury your head in the sand. Also the extremes that right wing groups are going is another clear indication that something is going on. Mistakes happen, but there has been a concentrated effort to deliberately suppress votes. Its like they invent the problem so they can put forward their solution.

1 Reply

@revelette,

Quote:

When you have almost no evidence of voter fraud but huge evidence of voter suppression, it is logical to assume that something is going on, to not assume such is to bury your head in the sand.

That bury your head in the sand seems to be a strong characteristic of a large number of Americans, Rev.

“The crimes of the U.S. throughout the world have been systematic, constant, clinical, remorseless, and fully documented but nobody talks about them.”
― Harold Pinter

Why do you think that is?

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@Brandon9000,

Quote:

The citizens have a legitimate right to keep non-citizens from voting and it cannot be impossible to enforce.

I agree completely with this. However, this has absolutely nothing to do with any of the current laws we are discussing. The laws Republicans are pushing right now aren't designed to keep non-citizens from voting.

In the past 10 years the number of non-citizens who have voted has been so low that you can count them on one hand. These laws are designed to lower the number of American citizens casting votes for Democratic candidates.

Quote:

You cannot win the argument that any law whatever designed to keep illegals from voting must of necessity be unfair.

I am not arguing that any law designed to keep non-citizens from voting is unfair. I am pointing out that a law that keeps tens of thousands of citizens from voting is absolutely unfair, particularly when the American citizens being purged are largely Hispanic and black (two constituencies who typically vote against Republicans.

The facts are that this law in Florida has affected lots of American citizens and as of yet hasn't found any non-citizens.

Quote:

Any law which frequently accuses innocent people is unacceptable. I agree with that ...

Yes! So you can be reasonable. This should end the argument.

Quote:

You can criticize some particular example of a law, but you cannot win the argument that any law which attempts to filter out non-citizens from voting must of necessity be unfair.

If there were a problem with non-citizens voting, then I would agree with you. We are all in agreement that non-citizens shouldn't be allowed to vote. However there are easy ways to check for this. And when we check for this we see that even a Teabagger can count the number of instances that this happens without taking off his pants.

Purging the voting rights of 20,000 American citizens to stop 2 "illegals" from voting it is unfair.

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@maxdancona,

Let me get this straight.

You seem to be saying that the laws requiring voters to show ID are inherrently unfair.
I must disagree with that.

How is it unfair to require anyone to present a valid ID to show who they are?
Getting an ID is not that difficult, nor is it that expensive.
For example, getting a state ID in Indiana to use for voting purposes is free...

http://www.in.gov/sos/elections/2625.htm

Quote:

To obtain a free ID card for voting purposes from any BMV license branch, you will need to supply the necessary documentation as explained on the BMV's flyer

And here is their flyer...
http://www.in.gov/bmv/files/SecureID_Documents_List.pdf

So the claim that getting an ID is discriminatory to minorities is a non starter.
And in Indiana, you can still vote without the proper documentation, but you have 10 days to provide the documents if you want your ballot to count.

2 Replies

@mysteryman,

If an 81 year old has been voting for 60 years, why should they now have to provide ID? They don't drive. They don't have a copy of their birth certificate. They can't really get one because they were born at home. They are in a assisted living so can't just head down to the local license branch. Because they are in assisted living, they don't have any bills with their address on them or mortgage or any of the other several documents of which 2 are required to prove their address.. But no, it's not an inconvenience to them according to you? It's just a lot more difficult than if they were 50 and owned their own home and had a driver's license.

Really MM. It shows a complete lack of understanding how others would have to deal with the issue.

0 Replies

May I see your papers, citizen?

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