● Using the Department of Justice, friendly governors, and its usual propaganda outlets, the GOP has propagated the myth of voter fraud to purge the rolls of non-Republicans.
● Widespread “voter fraud” is a myth promulgated to suppress voter participation, according to a new Project Vote report released this week. Analysis of federal government records concludes that only 24 people were convicted of or pleaded guilty to illegal voting between 2002 and 2005, an average of eight people a year. The available state-level evidence of fraudulent voting, culled from interviews, reviews of newspaper coverage and court proceedings paints a similar picture.
● (PDF) The Politics of Voter Fraud, by Lorraine C. Minnite, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Political Science, Barnard College, Columbia University
Study's Key Findings:
• Voter fraud is the “intentional corruption of the electoral process by the voter.”
• Voter fraud is extremely rare.
• The lack of evidence of voter fraud is not because of a failure to codify it.
• Most voter fraud allegations turn out to be something other than fraud.
• The more complex are the rules regulating voter registration and voting, the more likely voter mistakes, clerical errors, and the like will be wrongly identified as “fraud.”
• There is a long history in America of elites using voter fraud allegations to restrict and shape the electorate.
• The historically disenfranchised are often the target of voter fraud allegations.
• Better data collection and election administration will improve the public discussion of voter fraud and lead to more appropriate policies.
● (PDF) Study's Key Findings
● (PDF) A recent national survey sponsored by the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law reveals that millions of American citizens do not have readily available documentary proof of citizenship. Many more – primarily women – do not have proof of citizenship with their current name. The survey also showed that millions of American citizens do not have government-issued photo identification, such as a driver’s license or passport. Finally, the survey demonstrated that certain groups – primarily poor, elderly, and minority citizens – are less likely to possess these forms of documentation than the general population.
7 of 9 Supreme Court justices were nominated by Republican presidents.
● Supreme Court upholds Indiana's vote photo ID law, says states can demand photo ID for voting...even though there is ZERO cases of voter fraud in Indiana's history!
● Voter Advocate Rush Limbaugh Applauds Supreme Court's 'Huge, Huge, Huge Move to Undercut Democrat Voter Fraud'. Polling Place Photo ID Restrictions in Indiana Upheld by SCOTUS in Courageous and Historic Dredd Scott-like Decision. But Why Stop at Keeping Black and Elderly Fraudsters from Stealing Elections?...
● How to Cast a Ballot in Indiana if You Don't Have State-Issued Photo ID...
● Was Campaigning Against Voter Fraud a Republican Ploy? A New Mexico lawyer who pressed to oust U.S. Attorney David Iglesias was an officer of a nonprofit group that aided Republican candidates in 2006 by pressing for tougher voter identification laws.
Mark "Thor" Hearne, of the fake "voters' rights" group ACVR, created to push the myth of "voter fraud" for the GOP.
● With no notice and little comment, ACVR—the only prominent nongovernmental organization claiming that voter fraud is a major problem, a problem warranting strict rules such as voter-ID laws—simply stopped appearing at government panels and conferences. Its Web domain name has suddenly expired, its reports are all gone (except where they have been preserved by its opponents), and its general counsel, Mark "Thor" Hearne, has cleansed his résumé of affiliation with the group. Hearne won't speak to the press about ACVR's demise. No other group has taken up the "voter fraud" mantra.
● Hearne apparently wasn't satisfied with just cleansing his résumé. Despite the Slate article and follow-up by NPR, National Journal, and St. Louis Post-Dispatch on Hearne, ACVR, and his possible connection to the U.S. attorneys' scandal, someone is working hard to scrub Hearne's paper trail. And now somebody is going into Hearne's Wikipedia entry and trying to cleanse it of references to ACVR.
● The mysteries surrounding ACVR as well as its various connections to highly partisan groups, to some of the members of the commission and to some of the witnesses and speakers are so complex that RAW STORY had to create a visual representation of entanglements in order to better clarify on how this group may have developed.
(click on map below, to enlarge)
