Update II: Wisconsin Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen won't clarify statement asserting Wisconsin will "have voter ID on election day," (Hall, Wisconsin State Journal) mostly likely because the corrupt partisan is already bordering on the edge of a process for a contempt citation.
Update: Despite the six-to-three decision by the US Supreme Court blocking voter ID in Wisconsin, Wisconsin's corrupt attorney general, J.B. Van Hollen, says "We will be exploring alternatives to address the Court's concern and have voter ID on election day." (Bolin, WKOW) One wonders if Van Hollen actually read the Court's order reinstating the "permanent injunction" of Wisconsin's photo voter ID law.
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Constitutional scholars and voting rights attorneys contacted the last few weeks described the Sept. 12 order (and the supporting appellate opinions) reinstating (for 27 days it turns out) Wisconsin's photo voter ID law as disingenuous, unconscionable and unconstitutional.
The legal case against courts' changing election law close to (indeed after Wisconsin's election had begun) is a "no-brainer" (Hasen) and air-tight.
So why would Scott Walker and Wisconsin Attorney General go to extraordinary lengths to get a judicial imprimatur to implement the Voter ID law after our election had begun?
Because, as Scott Walker through Van Hollen's DoJ, conceded in the federal trial last year some 300,000 Wisconsin citizens lack the restrictive range of photo voter IDs needed to vote.
Enough of those 300,000 voters don't vote and Scott Walker wins reelection.
Walker and the Republicans likely will not pay a price for blocking registered voters from voting, unless the targeted voters follow the advice of a friend from Door county: Never give up.
Most people are not students of constitutional rights and winning constitutional rights from the majority has always been a struggle; Republicans are hostile to the civil rights movement, and this writer has seen the reaction of white citizens to the sight of a black man voting: Distaste and hostility.
Wisconsin election bureaucracies are too passive and timid to stand up and state the facts about the barriers imposed against voters, to advocate for voters.
Judge Frank Easterbrook of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit has shown his true colors, and made up facts out of whole cloth in his deplorable work on behalf of the Republican Party in his hastily released opinion earlier this week.
A man of Easterbrook's gifts employs them for corrupt purposes, unforgivable.
Rick Hasen cautions this morning that Wisconsin should not be too excited that the Court "did the right thing now in the Wisconsin case. But don’t expect them to continue doing the right thing. The Chief [John Roberts] and Justice Kennedy will very likely be with today’s Wisconsin dissenters on the merits down the line."
There is no expectation that privileged elites will keep doing the right thing, and there never has been.
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For more reaction, here are comments from the ACLU and the Advancement Project, working for the many plaintiffs in Ruthelle Frank v. Scott Walker.
From Dale Ho, director of the ACLU's Voting Rights Project: "Today's order puts the brakes on the last-minute disruption and voter chaos created by this law going into effect so close to the election. It will help safeguard the vote for thousands of Wisconsinites as this case makes its way through the courts."
Advancement
Project Senior Attorney and Director of Voter Protection, Katherine
Culliton-González. - See more at:
http://www.advancementproject.org/news/entry/wisconsin-voter-id-law-halted-as-supreme-court-blocks-appeals-court-order#sthash.Xq8O3DBV.dpuf
From Advancement Project Senior Attorney and Director of Voter Protection, Katherine Culliton-González: "While there is zero evidence of voter fraud, Wisconsin’s voter ID law would have risked disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of registered voters if it were allowed to take effect. The Supreme Court was absolutely correct in refusing to fast-track restricting access to the ballot in the upcoming election. Voting is the one time when we are all equal. Whether you’re young or old, rich or poor, Black, White, Latino, Asian or Native American – when we vote, we all have the same say. But this is not the end of the fight. We will keep working to ensure that this law is permanently enjoined, so that all voters can continue to have a voice in our democracy."
Advancement
Project Senior Attorney and Director of Voter Protection, Katherine
Culliton-González. - See more at:
http://www.advancementproject.org/news/entry/wisconsin-voter-id-law-halted-as-supreme-court-blocks-appeals-court-order#sthash.Xq8O3DBV.dpuf
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