Unable to produce any cases of in-person voter fraud in Wisconsin, the Republican Party of Wisconsin was forced to commit voter fraud, though a different kind.
Chris Liebenthal has the story.
Milwaukee County Supervisor Deanna Alexander, a rising star among Wisconsin Republicans, willfully informed her constituents that photo voter ID would be needed to vote, knowing fully well that this is not the case in Wisconsin.
Judge Richard Posner of the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit notes this is the voter fraud known as intentional "Misinformation" in his dissent in Ruthelle Frank v. Scott Walker (On Suggestion of Rehearing En Banc, October 20, 2014) (p.
12).
Posner's offers a "nonexhaustive" list of voter fraud, citing Voter Fraud Facts.
One hopes this crime is investigated and criminal charges are filed.
Showing posts with label scott walker voter id. Show all posts
Showing posts with label scott walker voter id. Show all posts
Jan 26, 2015
Oct 6, 2014
Election Law Expert: Easterbrook's Seventh Circuit Opinion: Horrendous
Rick Hasen rushed out a response to the Seventh Circuit's opinion on the merits of Wisconsin's Voter ID cases.
My fav: "The opinion puts forward the narrowest test yet I’ve seen for deciding when a vote denial type claim (which Easterbrook calls a voter qualification claim) violates section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. He cites statistics showing whites are much, ... more likely than blacks in Milwaukee to have a driver’s license (the easiest form of voter id to use in WI if you have it). No big deal he says: black voting rates are high enough, and so long as “everyone has the same opportunity to get a qualifying voter ID” in Wisconsin there can be no voting rights violation. Never mind that because of past discrimination African-American voters are on average poorer and will have a harder time coming up with the money for the underlying documents for a voter id. The rich and poor can both sleep under bridges. To Easterbrook, one just “scrounges” the money to get the birth certificate—there is no sensitivity that not everyone is as rich as a federal judge."
Easterbrook wants Judge Kagen to throw the case to the full Court.
Kagen will likely at least partially vacate the Seventh Circuit's stay.
My fav: "The opinion puts forward the narrowest test yet I’ve seen for deciding when a vote denial type claim (which Easterbrook calls a voter qualification claim) violates section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. He cites statistics showing whites are much, ... more likely than blacks in Milwaukee to have a driver’s license (the easiest form of voter id to use in WI if you have it). No big deal he says: black voting rates are high enough, and so long as “everyone has the same opportunity to get a qualifying voter ID” in Wisconsin there can be no voting rights violation. Never mind that because of past discrimination African-American voters are on average poorer and will have a harder time coming up with the money for the underlying documents for a voter id. The rich and poor can both sleep under bridges. To Easterbrook, one just “scrounges” the money to get the birth certificate—there is no sensitivity that not everyone is as rich as a federal judge."
Easterbrook wants Judge Kagen to throw the case to the full Court.
Kagen will likely at least partially vacate the Seventh Circuit's stay.
Oct 2, 2014
Scholars See Strong Case Wisconsin Voter ID Law Will Be Halted Before Election Day
Reading Prof. Ned Foley's piece this morning on the Due Process Clause questions presented by the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit's stay of Judge Lynn Adelman's April injunction (April 29, 2014) of Wisconsin's Photo Voter ID law, in Foley's text appeared a eureka moment.
The Seventh Circuit's panel's changing the rules on Sept. 12 after 1,000s of residents had already cast their absentee ballots raises "severe due process claims," Foley said this afternoon reached by phone.
Writes Foley in his article: "The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment has been properly interpreted to bar changes in the rules for counting ballots after they have been cast."
Here's a section of Foley's piece (brought to wide attention by Rick Hasen) that brings to the fore Due Process Clause concerns; writes Foley:
There is one more crucial point about the Wisconsin case that has not yet been fully developed. As a factual matter, the emergency stay application observes that absentee ballots have been already been cast based on a rule in place (per the April injunction (by Judge Adelman)) that the new voter ID requirement did not apply. The Seventh Circuit’s reinstatement of the ID requirement now makes those absentee ballots void and uncountable unless the voters come forth with the required ID—a requirement not in effect at the time when they cast those ballots. Indeed, the instructions that these absentee voters received with their ballot did not alert them to the need to provide the required ID. The stay application says that to disenfranchise these absentee voters “after the fact” based on a change in the rules since they cast those ballots would be “unconscionable” (page 14)—unconscionability being a potent "equitable" factor.
But it would be more than unconscionable. It would be unconstitutional. The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment has been properly interpreted to bar changes in the rules for counting ballots after they have been cast.
The Emergency petition filed this morning to the U.S. Supreme Court did not specifically, to Foley's eye, contain a "citation to these Due Process precedents [Foley mentioned] in the Wisconsin emergency stay application, or an explicit reference to Due Process or the Constitution."
But in Emergency petitions, or "applications" (see A Reporter's Guide to Applications Pending Before the Supreme Court of the United States), Foley said, there is much "flexibility" the U.S. Supreme Court justices have "especially in an emergency petition."
Moreover, said Foley, "the court could research on its own" federal precedents that would bring to the attention of the justice(s) Due Process Clause rights retained by litigants. This is the Supreme Court after all.
Justice Elena Kagan, the justice assigned to the Seventh Circuit, may act on her own; or bring the application to the full Court for consideration, unlikely since Wisconsin's Election Day is some 30 days away on November 4.
Prof. Foley would not speculate but added among the possible outcomes are that Justice Kagan could partially vacate the stay, or vacate the stay entirely bringing our election back to the status quo before the Seventh Circuit's infamous Sept. 12 ruling, a ruling with opinions that have been described as "disingenuous" by Rick Hasen, a respected election law expert.
This afternoon, Justice Kagan ordered Wisconsin represented by Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen to respond to the Emergency application by October 7, 5:00 pm. That's 28 days before Election Day.
Here is the U.S. Supreme Court docket for the application.
Concludes Foley in his piece:
The affected Wisconsin absentee voters cast their ballots with one set of rules in force at the time. These voters had a reasonable expectation that their ballots would count as cast if they complied with those rules then in force. To change the rules for counting ballots after they have been cast seems to be one of the most dangerous practices in the administration of an electoral democracy—which is precisely why such a rule-change has been held to violate Due Process.
But an even stronger reason to vacate the stay granted by the Seventh Circuit is that this stay, given the specific facts applicable to the absentee voters, would itself violate the Due Process principle articulated in Griffin v. Burns (570 F.2d 1065 (1st Cir. 1978)) and similar cases.
Writes Rick Hasen today: "C’mon folks. This should be a no brainer. You don’t impose new requirements in the weeks before an election without adequate preparation which runs the serious risk of disenfranchising voters. If the Supreme Court doesn’t recognize that, we are in even worse shape than I thought."
The consolidated cases, (Frank v. Walker, and League of United Latin American Citizens of Wisconsin v. Deininger) have not been heard on their merits in federal appellate court, but Justice Kagan's vacating the stay would preserve the votes of potentially 100,000s of Wisconsin voters this November.
After that, litigation would proceed through the federal court system is an orderly and one hopes not a disingenuous manner.
The Seventh Circuit's panel's changing the rules on Sept. 12 after 1,000s of residents had already cast their absentee ballots raises "severe due process claims," Foley said this afternoon reached by phone.
Writes Foley in his article: "The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment has been properly interpreted to bar changes in the rules for counting ballots after they have been cast."
Here's a section of Foley's piece (brought to wide attention by Rick Hasen) that brings to the fore Due Process Clause concerns; writes Foley:
There is one more crucial point about the Wisconsin case that has not yet been fully developed. As a factual matter, the emergency stay application observes that absentee ballots have been already been cast based on a rule in place (per the April injunction (by Judge Adelman)) that the new voter ID requirement did not apply. The Seventh Circuit’s reinstatement of the ID requirement now makes those absentee ballots void and uncountable unless the voters come forth with the required ID—a requirement not in effect at the time when they cast those ballots. Indeed, the instructions that these absentee voters received with their ballot did not alert them to the need to provide the required ID. The stay application says that to disenfranchise these absentee voters “after the fact” based on a change in the rules since they cast those ballots would be “unconscionable” (page 14)—unconscionability being a potent "equitable" factor.
But it would be more than unconscionable. It would be unconstitutional. The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment has been properly interpreted to bar changes in the rules for counting ballots after they have been cast.
The Emergency petition filed this morning to the U.S. Supreme Court did not specifically, to Foley's eye, contain a "citation to these Due Process precedents [Foley mentioned] in the Wisconsin emergency stay application, or an explicit reference to Due Process or the Constitution."
But in Emergency petitions, or "applications" (see A Reporter's Guide to Applications Pending Before the Supreme Court of the United States), Foley said, there is much "flexibility" the U.S. Supreme Court justices have "especially in an emergency petition."
Moreover, said Foley, "the court could research on its own" federal precedents that would bring to the attention of the justice(s) Due Process Clause rights retained by litigants. This is the Supreme Court after all.
Justice Elena Kagan, the justice assigned to the Seventh Circuit, may act on her own; or bring the application to the full Court for consideration, unlikely since Wisconsin's Election Day is some 30 days away on November 4.
Prof. Foley would not speculate but added among the possible outcomes are that Justice Kagan could partially vacate the stay, or vacate the stay entirely bringing our election back to the status quo before the Seventh Circuit's infamous Sept. 12 ruling, a ruling with opinions that have been described as "disingenuous" by Rick Hasen, a respected election law expert.
This afternoon, Justice Kagan ordered Wisconsin represented by Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen to respond to the Emergency application by October 7, 5:00 pm. That's 28 days before Election Day.
Here is the U.S. Supreme Court docket for the application.
Concludes Foley in his piece:
The affected Wisconsin absentee voters cast their ballots with one set of rules in force at the time. These voters had a reasonable expectation that their ballots would count as cast if they complied with those rules then in force. To change the rules for counting ballots after they have been cast seems to be one of the most dangerous practices in the administration of an electoral democracy—which is precisely why such a rule-change has been held to violate Due Process.
But an even stronger reason to vacate the stay granted by the Seventh Circuit is that this stay, given the specific facts applicable to the absentee voters, would itself violate the Due Process principle articulated in Griffin v. Burns (570 F.2d 1065 (1st Cir. 1978)) and similar cases.
Writes Rick Hasen today: "C’mon folks. This should be a no brainer. You don’t impose new requirements in the weeks before an election without adequate preparation which runs the serious risk of disenfranchising voters. If the Supreme Court doesn’t recognize that, we are in even worse shape than I thought."
The consolidated cases, (Frank v. Walker, and League of United Latin American Citizens of Wisconsin v. Deininger) have not been heard on their merits in federal appellate court, but Justice Kagan's vacating the stay would preserve the votes of potentially 100,000s of Wisconsin voters this November.
After that, litigation would proceed through the federal court system is an orderly and one hopes not a disingenuous manner.
Must-read Election Analysis by Ned Foley at Moritzlaw.osu
By Edward B. Foley - Moritz College of Law; Charles W. Ebersold and Florence Whitcomb Ebersold Chair in Constitutional Law; Director, Election Law @ Moritz
There is one more crucial point about the Wisconsin case that has not yet been fully developed. As a factual matter, the emergency stay application observes that absentee ballots have been already been cast based on a rule in place (per the April injunction) that the new voter ID requirement did not apply. The Seventh Circuit’s reinstatement of the ID requirement now makes those absentee ballots void and uncountable unless the voters come forth with the required ID—a requirement not in effect at the time when they cast those ballots. Indeed, the instructions that these absentee voters received with their ballot did not alert them to the need to provide the required ID. The stay application says that to disenfranchise these absentee voters “after the fact” based on a change in the rules since they cast those ballots would be “unconscionable” (page 14)—unconscionability being a potent “equitable” factor.
But it would be more than unconscionable. It would be unconstitutional. The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment has been properly interpreted to bar changes in the rules for counting ballots after they have been cast. The leading case, from the First Circuit, is Griffin v. Burns, 570 F.2d 1065 (1st Cir. 1978). It, too, involved absentee ballots. Rhode Island election officials had made absentee ballots available to voters. After the ballots had been cast, the state supreme court ruled that these voters should not have received those ballots. (It was a primary election, and the state court said absentee ballots were available only in general elections.) Too late, said the First Circuit. It violates Due Process to give voters ballots telling them they will count if cast and then, after they are cast, say “surprise” they won’t count after all.
---
H/T to Rick Hasen
There is one more crucial point about the Wisconsin case that has not yet been fully developed. As a factual matter, the emergency stay application observes that absentee ballots have been already been cast based on a rule in place (per the April injunction) that the new voter ID requirement did not apply. The Seventh Circuit’s reinstatement of the ID requirement now makes those absentee ballots void and uncountable unless the voters come forth with the required ID—a requirement not in effect at the time when they cast those ballots. Indeed, the instructions that these absentee voters received with their ballot did not alert them to the need to provide the required ID. The stay application says that to disenfranchise these absentee voters “after the fact” based on a change in the rules since they cast those ballots would be “unconscionable” (page 14)—unconscionability being a potent “equitable” factor.
But it would be more than unconscionable. It would be unconstitutional. The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment has been properly interpreted to bar changes in the rules for counting ballots after they have been cast. The leading case, from the First Circuit, is Griffin v. Burns, 570 F.2d 1065 (1st Cir. 1978). It, too, involved absentee ballots. Rhode Island election officials had made absentee ballots available to voters. After the ballots had been cast, the state supreme court ruled that these voters should not have received those ballots. (It was a primary election, and the state court said absentee ballots were available only in general elections.) Too late, said the First Circuit. It violates Due Process to give voters ballots telling them they will count if cast and then, after they are cast, say “surprise” they won’t count after all.
---
H/T to Rick Hasen
Non-profits, Dems Educate Wisconsin on Voter ID; Municipal-State Bureaucracies Flounder
Update: Madison and Dane County have jointly launched a Public Outreach Campaign on Voter ID one day following Jessie Opoien's piece in the Capital Times.
One in five voters don't know they need a GOP-approved photo voter ID to vote, reports Jessie Opoien in The Capital Times.
Opoien's piece was posted minutes before news hit that an emergency petition to the U.S. Supreme Court had been filed by multiple plaintiffs to block Wisconsin's photo voter ID law this morning.
"Young voters are least likely to know about the requirement, with 26 percent of voters ages 18-29 unaware," notes Opoien.
Good news for the Republicans.
Bad news for Wisconsin democracy.
To borrow from Pogo with a little citizen Don Ystad thrown in, 'we have found the enemy and he is us,' - the voters. So the Republican Party believes.
Meanwhile, the Government Accountability Board (GAB) is asking the Wisconsin legislature for "$460,800 for a statewide TV, radio and online campaign to educate residents about the voter identification law that will be in effect for the Nov. 4 election." (Green Bay Press Gazette)
That will help.
So would the GAB speaking up for the voters, echoing the point that changing the rules after elections have begun is likely to disfranchise voters.
So, Wisconsin's 1,852 municipal clerks with staff administer and implement the conflicting guidelines from the GAB to educate the electorate: Result, one in five voters don't know what to do.
Election law experts call this a failing grade.
I helped a voter cast her absentee ballot after receiving conflicting statements from the municipal clerk's office on photo voter ID.
Confusion came from the GAB, I was told. I believe it.
---
Difficult to administer an unconstitutional law when the rules are changed after voting has already begun.
No serious jurist who not a partisan Republican believes Wisconsin's Act 23 should have ever passed muster with the Wisconsin Supreme Court, or the federal Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.
So, we wait for the U.S. Supreme Court, likely to rule within days if not hours.
Meanwhile the Wisconsin League of Women Voters is desperately trying to educate the public.
The ACLU is desperately trying to educate the public.
The Democratic Party is desperately trying to educate the public.
Wisconsin Public Radio and Wisconsin Public Television, and on and on.
One in five voters don't know they need a GOP-approved photo voter ID to vote, reports Jessie Opoien in The Capital Times.
Opoien's piece was posted minutes before news hit that an emergency petition to the U.S. Supreme Court had been filed by multiple plaintiffs to block Wisconsin's photo voter ID law this morning.
"Young voters are least likely to know about the requirement, with 26 percent of voters ages 18-29 unaware," notes Opoien.
Good news for the Republicans.
Bad news for Wisconsin democracy.
To borrow from Pogo with a little citizen Don Ystad thrown in, 'we have found the enemy and he is us,' - the voters. So the Republican Party believes.
Meanwhile, the Government Accountability Board (GAB) is asking the Wisconsin legislature for "$460,800 for a statewide TV, radio and online campaign to educate residents about the voter identification law that will be in effect for the Nov. 4 election." (Green Bay Press Gazette)
That will help.
So would the GAB speaking up for the voters, echoing the point that changing the rules after elections have begun is likely to disfranchise voters.
So, Wisconsin's 1,852 municipal clerks with staff administer and implement the conflicting guidelines from the GAB to educate the electorate: Result, one in five voters don't know what to do.
Election law experts call this a failing grade.
I helped a voter cast her absentee ballot after receiving conflicting statements from the municipal clerk's office on photo voter ID.
Confusion came from the GAB, I was told. I believe it.
---
Difficult to administer an unconstitutional law when the rules are changed after voting has already begun.
No serious jurist who not a partisan Republican believes Wisconsin's Act 23 should have ever passed muster with the Wisconsin Supreme Court, or the federal Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.
So, we wait for the U.S. Supreme Court, likely to rule within days if not hours.
Meanwhile the Wisconsin League of Women Voters is desperately trying to educate the public.
The ACLU is desperately trying to educate the public.
The Democratic Party is desperately trying to educate the public.
Wisconsin Public Radio and Wisconsin Public Television, and on and on.
Emergency Petition to US Supreme Court Filed to Block Wisconsin Voter ID Law
Update: ACLU site: The following is a statement from Dale Ho, director of the ACLU's Voting Rights Project:
"Thousands of Wisconsin voters stand to be disenfranchised by this law going into effect so close to the election. Hundreds of absentee ballots have already been cast, and the appeals court's order is fueling voter confusion and election chaos. Eleventh-hour changes in election rules have traditionally been disfavored precisely because the risk of disruption is simply too high."
---
"[T]here is an overwhelming public interest in not disenfranchising large numbers of registered voters." (p. 19, Emergency Application to Vacate Stay RE Wisconsin Act 23) (emphasis added)
Via Rick Hasen, here's the text of the petition.
Emergency Application to Vacate Stay
To the Honorable Elena Kagan, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court and Circuit Justice for the Seventh Circuit:
... Unless this Court vacates the order below, the panel’s stay will sow confusion at the polls and discourage voting in the November 4 general election in Wisconsin. Voting is the foundational element of a free society. Chaos in an election— especially when entirely preventable—is undemocratic. Yet weeks before a major election, the panel’s stay order dramatically changed the status quo for voters— i.e. , the continuation of Wisconsin’s traditional voting practices and suspension of Act 23’s stringent new photo ID requirements. (p.2)
Correct.
In fact one in five Wisconsin citizens do not know they need a photo voter ID to cast a vote. (Jessie Opoien, The Capital Times)
As for the Big Lie of in-person voter fraud:
[T]he court found that, after two years of litigation, “[t]he defendants could not point to a single instance of known voter impersonation occurring in Wisconsin at any time in the recent past.” App.49. Even taking unresolved reports of voting fraud into account, “[t]he rate of potential voter-impersonation fraud is . . . exceedingly tiny”; “virtually no voter impersonation occurs in Wisconsin”; and “it is exceedingly unlikely that voter impersonation will become a problem in Wisconsin in the foreseeable future.” App.48, 50, 53. Thereafter, the court denied the State’s motion to stay the injunction pending appeal, concluding “that it is absolutely clear that Act 23 will prevent more legitimate votes from being cast than fraudulent votes.” App.75. (p.7)
"Thousands of Wisconsin voters stand to be disenfranchised by this law going into effect so close to the election. Hundreds of absentee ballots have already been cast, and the appeals court's order is fueling voter confusion and election chaos. Eleventh-hour changes in election rules have traditionally been disfavored precisely because the risk of disruption is simply too high."
---
"[T]here is an overwhelming public interest in not disenfranchising large numbers of registered voters." (p. 19, Emergency Application to Vacate Stay RE Wisconsin Act 23) (emphasis added)
Via Rick Hasen, here's the text of the petition.
Emergency Application to Vacate Stay
To the Honorable Elena Kagan, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court and Circuit Justice for the Seventh Circuit:
... Unless this Court vacates the order below, the panel’s stay will sow confusion at the polls and discourage voting in the November 4 general election in Wisconsin. Voting is the foundational element of a free society. Chaos in an election— especially when entirely preventable—is undemocratic. Yet weeks before a major election, the panel’s stay order dramatically changed the status quo for voters— i.e. , the continuation of Wisconsin’s traditional voting practices and suspension of Act 23’s stringent new photo ID requirements. (p.2)
Correct.
In fact one in five Wisconsin citizens do not know they need a photo voter ID to cast a vote. (Jessie Opoien, The Capital Times)
As for the Big Lie of in-person voter fraud:
[T]he court found that, after two years of litigation, “[t]he defendants could not point to a single instance of known voter impersonation occurring in Wisconsin at any time in the recent past.” App.49. Even taking unresolved reports of voting fraud into account, “[t]he rate of potential voter-impersonation fraud is . . . exceedingly tiny”; “virtually no voter impersonation occurs in Wisconsin”; and “it is exceedingly unlikely that voter impersonation will become a problem in Wisconsin in the foreseeable future.” App.48, 50, 53. Thereafter, the court denied the State’s motion to stay the injunction pending appeal, concluding “that it is absolutely clear that Act 23 will prevent more legitimate votes from being cast than fraudulent votes.” App.75. (p.7)
One in five Wisconsin voters: Don't know they'll need photo ID to vote
Jessie Opoien in The Capital Times has the story this morning.
Writes Opoien: "According to the most recent Marquette University Law School poll, released Wednesday, 20 percent of registered voters said — wrongly — that voters will not have to show an ID on Election Day. Among likely voters, the number was 18 percent."
For Republicans, these are dream numbers.
Confusion and chaos via dirty tricks and it's all legal.
Forget the Wisconsin and United States Constitutions, of no concern to GOP judges.
Frank Easterbrook of the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit leads the way in our district, giving the imprimatur of GOP hacks on the bench.
Wisconsin's 1,852 municipal clerks are not to blame; not many expect clerks to act as civil liberty advocates.
Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner posters don't exactly line the walls at Wisconsin municipal buildings.
Suffrage, what's that? When the Packers lose?
The Wisconsin Governmental Accountability Board, Kevin Kennedy and Mike Haas for example, are complicit but only after the fact, refusing public criticism of the law and the GOP judges corrupt results-directed ruling as Wisconsin citizens face their voting rights blocked after our election had already begun.
Maybe a GAB official will speak up and express concern about Wisconsin citizens not being able to vote?
Nah.
Better to remain silent, and hope the ACLU files an emergency petition to the U.S. Supreme Court fast. [And they and other plaintiffs just did.]
Passive compliance from bureaucrats is to be expected; shocking.
Writes Opoien: "According to the most recent Marquette University Law School poll, released Wednesday, 20 percent of registered voters said — wrongly — that voters will not have to show an ID on Election Day. Among likely voters, the number was 18 percent."
For Republicans, these are dream numbers.
Confusion and chaos via dirty tricks and it's all legal.
Forget the Wisconsin and United States Constitutions, of no concern to GOP judges.
Frank Easterbrook of the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit leads the way in our district, giving the imprimatur of GOP hacks on the bench.
Wisconsin's 1,852 municipal clerks are not to blame; not many expect clerks to act as civil liberty advocates.
Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner posters don't exactly line the walls at Wisconsin municipal buildings.
Suffrage, what's that? When the Packers lose?
The Wisconsin Governmental Accountability Board, Kevin Kennedy and Mike Haas for example, are complicit but only after the fact, refusing public criticism of the law and the GOP judges corrupt results-directed ruling as Wisconsin citizens face their voting rights blocked after our election had already begun.
Maybe a GAB official will speak up and express concern about Wisconsin citizens not being able to vote?
Nah.
Better to remain silent, and hope the ACLU files an emergency petition to the U.S. Supreme Court fast. [And they and other plaintiffs just did.]
Passive compliance from bureaucrats is to be expected; shocking.
May 16, 2014
Wisconsin Attorney General Refuses to Defend Constitutional Law Enforcement Officers
 |
| Wisconsin Attorney General refuses to defend Constitutional law enforcement officers |
Randa's is an absurdly activist and corrupt decision, heavily criticized among jurists.
Randa has stepped in the middle of a law enforcement investigation conducted by Wisconsin constitutional officers (district attorneys, Article VI, section 4) who are empowered by Wisconsin statutes to conduct John Doe probes in specific circumstances.
Attorney General J. B. Van Hollen should be attempting to intervene in Eric O’Keefe and Wisconsin Club for Growth, Inc. v Francis Schmitz, et al. (Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel document) and defend Wisconsin constitutional officers in their criminal justice investigation.
The fact that Van Hollen is sitting this case out speaks to the fact that Van Hollen feels his duty is to the Republican Party of Wisconsin and not the people and Constitution of Wisconsin.
When Van Hollen feels his party is threatened by litigation, Van Hollen's Department of Justice (DoJ) has no hesitation constructing any argument no matter the effect on the rights of Wisconsin citizens, if the DoJ would prevail.
Consider Van Hollen's effort to try to stay the injunction against Wisconsin's photo voter ID law, Act 23, designed to obstruct Wisconsin voters (Frank v. Walker; League of United Latin American Citizens of Wisconsin v. Deininger).
Writes Van Hollen and the Wisconsin DoJ in a May 2014 motion to keep the GOP-crafted voter ID operative for the next election: “‘[A]ny time a State is enjoined by a court from effectuating statutes enacted by representatives of its people, it suffers a form of irreparable injury’” [Maryland v. King, ___ U.S. ___, 133 S. Ct. 1, 3 (2012)] (other citations omitted).
If Van Hollen truly feels this way, why is he not blasting away at Judge Randa in court and in the press?
May 2, 2014
Wisconsin AG Van Hollen Vows to Seek Stay of Decision Halting Voter ID
The Fifteenth Amendment reads in part, the "right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude."
Progressive Democrats, such as Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Madison) are hoping against hope that Speaker John Boehner will suddenly become amiable to amendments to take out the language of the VRAA that makes HR 3899 a steaming pile of very toxic and fetid waste. See this bizarre March 27, 2014 letter by House Democrats that in part reads "some of us believe the bill should be enacted in its current form, and some of us prefer to see it amended" in an appeal to John Boehner. This is the same John Boehner who said during the 2012 campaign that he hopes Latinos and Blacks do not show up and vote. (Reeve, August 27, 2012; Yahoo News) at a Christian Science Monitor luncheon.
Meanwhile, Sensenbrenner was caught on camera in February saying, "I hope the president vetoes the bill. If the president vetoes—well, let me rephrase that – if the president vetoes this bill, he will lose an awful lot of the African-American support that he has." (Roth. TRMS)
Anybody really doubt where Republicans like Sensenbrenner and Boehner stand on voting rights?
What if this anti-voter VRAA actually passes Congress? Did House Democrats consider this scenario?
Dumb, dumb, dumb.
---
Wisconsin Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen has learned a lot from Scott Walker in service to the Republican Party while ripping off the Wisconsin people.
Make up statements and don't back them up with facts.
For some three years during Walker's tenure Van Hollen has been using the attorney general's office in service to the Republican Party, and Van Hollen typically throws out fact-free lines for reporters' consumption.
Now, Van Hollen's office says Federal Judge Lynn Adelman's decision barring enforcement of Act 23 is "flawed," and the Wisconsin DoJ with Walker's blessing will seek a stay, vacating the permanent injunction. (Hall, Wisconsin State Journal)
What's flawed about the Adelman's decision? Van Hollen won't say.
But Van Hollen and Walker, with Rep. James Sensenbrenner's help, keep up their GOP-crafted-law-is-common sense and "constitutional" lines of malarkey.
Writes Adelman:
The evidence at trial established that virtually no voter impersonation occurs in Wisconsin. The defendants could not point to a single instance of known voter impersonation occurring in Wisconsin at any time in the recent past. ...What do Walker and Van Hollen and the Republicans say to this? Nothing.
Some have suggested that voter fraud might be more widespread than the low number of prosecutions indicates because the laws that prohibit voter fraud are under enforced. However, the defendants do not suggest that there is any underenforcement of such laws in Wisconsin. And the evidence at trial indicates that such laws are vigorously enforced (citations omitted by me).
Local conservative, William R. Wineke, has something to say today, Republicans should listen. Writes Wineke at Channel 3000 (WISC TV):
Ever since Republicans took control of state governments around the country in 2010, they have thrown conservative principles out the window.No, it's not. Stopping Americans from voting is unAmerican.
They keep passing laws to limit abortions and keep trying to pass laws that would outlaw some forms of birth control and force women who become pregnant from rapes or incest to bear their rapists’ children.
They use the power of state governments to interfere with the rights of local governments. Want to pass a minimum wage law for Milwaukee? Let’s strip the right of municipalities to do that.
But the voting rights thing is the big one. We all know why our state wants voter ID It’s because the governor and legislators who gained power through the ballot box want to make sure no one can take that power away from them through the ballot box.
That may be good politics, but it sure isn’t conservative.
Trying to stop Americans from voting is typical Van Hollen, and is a Republican mission. Recall Van Hollen's corrupt use of office in 2008, for example.
Van Hollen tried to use the Help America Vote Act to suppress Democratically leaning voters to stave off a landslide defeat for the McCain-Palin ticket of which he served as co-chair, an effort thrown out of court never to see light again.
In 2008, WisPolitics uncovered an audio recording revealing Van Hollen promising action on alleged "voter fraud" during an address at the Republican National Convention held in St. Paul, Minnesota, after multiple conversations with Reince Priebus, then Wisconsin GOP party chairman.
The fact that there is no voter fraud is of no concern in GOP land.
Said Wisconsin candidate for attorney general, Ismael Ozanne in April about Van Hollen's 2008 scheme: "The ethical concern is serving as campaign chair and then taking official actions as attorney general that are intended to benefit the campaign in question, and not reflecting the law and the best interests of the people of Wisconsin. If AG Van Hollen thought it was necessary in his official capacity to participate in legal action involving the campaign, he should have either stepped down from any role in the campaign or recused himself from the legal action."
Van Hollen, Walker and the Republicans should spend their time trying to help Americans vote, not attempting to prevent Americans from voting.
Apr 30, 2014
Voter ID Law Struck Down, Exposed Again As GOP Scheme to Obstruct Voters
Update: See also Exorcising the Voter Fraud Ghost (Hasen, Reuters), and A Federal Judge Searches for Voter Fraud in Wisconsin and Finds None (Cohen, The Atlantic), GOP’s Voter ID Sham Shot Down: Why a Federal Court Said No Way (Friedman, Salon), and Voter I.D. Is the Real Fraud (New York Times editorial, April 29, 2014).
It didn't take long for Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (Rochester, Wisconsin) and Scott Walker's office to declare their intentions to call a special session of the legislature to "do whatever it takes to ensure voter ID is in place as quickly as possible," in Vos' words to stop voter fraud.
This is of course a lie; there is no in-person voter fraud in Wisconsin and the media ought to report this fact.
When Republicans assert voter fraud, they should be held accountable in the news against facts.
The real story is: Republicans are lying and trying relentlessly to stop legal voters from voting. This is an affront to democracy.
Fortunately for Wisconsin, the GOP's obstructive scheme of voter ID, Act 23, is stopped dead in its tracks.
These two cases Judge Lynn Adelman ruled on will take years to get to the U.S. Supreme Court.
In the mean time, the GOP should be held accountable, and its efforts to obstruct the vote of Wisconsin citizens should be reported on and condemned.
From Wisconsin Federal District Judge Lynn Adelman's opinion:
"The evidence introduced by the plaintiffs confirms that voter-impersonation fraud does not occur in Wisconsin. The plaintiffs offered the testimony of Lorraine Minnite, a professor at Rutgers University who specializes in the study of the incidence of voter fraud in contemporary American elections. Professor Minnite studied elections in Wisconsin during the years 2004, 2008, 2010 and 2012 to determine whether she could identify any incidents of voter fraud. She consulted a variety of sources of information, including newspaper databases, news releases by the Wisconsin Attorney General, criminal complaints, decisions by state courts, and documents issued by the GAB. From these sources, Minnite was able to identify only one case of voter-impersonation fraud. Tr. 1036–42. And the single case of voter-impersonation fraud did not involve in-person voter impersonation. Rather, that case involved a man who applied for and cast his recently deceased wife’s absentee ballot. Tr. 1041. Thus, from Minnite’s work, it appears that there have been zero incidents of in-person voter-impersonation fraud in Wisconsin during recent elections."
It didn't take long for Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (Rochester, Wisconsin) and Scott Walker's office to declare their intentions to call a special session of the legislature to "do whatever it takes to ensure voter ID is in place as quickly as possible," in Vos' words to stop voter fraud.
This is of course a lie; there is no in-person voter fraud in Wisconsin and the media ought to report this fact.
When Republicans assert voter fraud, they should be held accountable in the news against facts.
The real story is: Republicans are lying and trying relentlessly to stop legal voters from voting. This is an affront to democracy.
Fortunately for Wisconsin, the GOP's obstructive scheme of voter ID, Act 23, is stopped dead in its tracks.
These two cases Judge Lynn Adelman ruled on will take years to get to the U.S. Supreme Court.
In the mean time, the GOP should be held accountable, and its efforts to obstruct the vote of Wisconsin citizens should be reported on and condemned.
From Wisconsin Federal District Judge Lynn Adelman's opinion:
"The evidence introduced by the plaintiffs confirms that voter-impersonation fraud does not occur in Wisconsin. The plaintiffs offered the testimony of Lorraine Minnite, a professor at Rutgers University who specializes in the study of the incidence of voter fraud in contemporary American elections. Professor Minnite studied elections in Wisconsin during the years 2004, 2008, 2010 and 2012 to determine whether she could identify any incidents of voter fraud. She consulted a variety of sources of information, including newspaper databases, news releases by the Wisconsin Attorney General, criminal complaints, decisions by state courts, and documents issued by the GAB. From these sources, Minnite was able to identify only one case of voter-impersonation fraud. Tr. 1036–42. And the single case of voter-impersonation fraud did not involve in-person voter impersonation. Rather, that case involved a man who applied for and cast his recently deceased wife’s absentee ballot. Tr. 1041. Thus, from Minnite’s work, it appears that there have been zero incidents of in-person voter-impersonation fraud in Wisconsin during recent elections."
Nov 8, 2013
GOP Paper Bashes Photo Voter ID Law, as Bureaucrat Swoons on Stand
.jpg) |
| The Raft of Medusa by Théodore Géricault (1819) |
We have asked if news outlets will play it dumb during what could be a landmark federal voting rights trial on photo voter ID taking place now in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Some news coverage and editorial comment of the voting rights trial [Frank v. Walker, (Case 11cv1128), and League of United Latin American Citizens of Wisconsin v. Deininger (Case 2:12-cv-00185, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin] are encouraging.
The testimony of the top Wisconsin election official is not encouraging.
Wisconsin newspaper staff across the state knows the GOP game is to attack the foundation of our democracy—voting.
The undesirables have no business on the Koch Ship, Wisconsin, the GOP believes: Discard them.
This morning's Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel is instructive of a different sentiment: "Don't change voter ID law; get rid of it."
No one ever accused the Journal-Sentinel as being anything other than a GOP-leaning paper, but on Photo Voter ID, the editorial page and news coverage have been consistently excellent, though this reader would like the editors to simply state that Scott Walker and the Republicans are a bunch of goddamn liars—something the Journal-Sentinel staff knows to be true.
Nationally, the Republican project to restrict voting is properly derided as anti-democratic, and racist (as an ancillary benefit for the Tea Party).
"You must register. You must vote. You must learn, so your choice advances your interest and the interest of our beloved Nation. Your future, and your children's future, depend upon it, and I don't believe that you are going to let them down.," said President Lyndon Johnson in the capitol rotunda at the signing of the Voting Rights Act. That was in 1965.
Today of course, LBJ's aspirations come as unwanted news to Wisconsin's Government Accountability Board (GAB) whose staff live in fear for their jobs; a couple of pro-voting rights moves and Republicans will pass legislation disbanding the GAB and replace the Board members with GOP partisans.
Kevin Kennedy, Director and General Counsel of the Wisconsin GAB testified yesterday that "his main concern about the 2011 photo voter-ID law was training the state’s uncommonly large number of elections workers." (AP report)
That's Kennedy's main concern?
The GAB states as its mission (in part) that "Wisconsin elections are administered through open, fair and impartial procedures that guarantee that the vote of each individual counts and that the will of the electorate prevails."
Under Act 23, constitutionally qualified, registered voters who have voted for decades can walk up to the polling table, state their name and address, and be told by their neighbors staffing the polling table: 'Hey, Don; good morning. Oh, no acceptable voter ID? Sorry man, you can't vote. Have to protect the integrity of the election, brother.'
Kennedy must have lost consciousness for a moment on the stand yesterday.
It seems repulsive that GAB staff will not stand up to the anti-American Republican Party attacking the very foundation of our democracy because Kennedy and his colleagues fear for their jobs, content to let the votes of citizens be discarded out of career convenience and passive compliance to GOP dictates.
Kennedy could have testified in this landmark case and spoke the truth that he well knows: That requiring Photo Voter IDs as narrowly prescribed by the GOP's Act 23 has the effect of stopping legal voters from voting, and has no rational basis because in-person voting fraud is a myth, actually a lie.
Kennedy took the easy way out in his appearance in federal court.
If the GAB is so afraid to utter a word to save the legal votes of legal Wisconsin voters, what good is this cowardly body against the many-tentacled Republican Party eviscerating our democratic processes?
Yes, I know there are dedicated and good people at the GAB, but if all they offer is their silence and acquiescence, they may as well not exist; they are a woefully inadequate life raft against the anti-democratic partisans working to rip apart the fabric of Wisconsin democracy.
Put simply, what part of government accountability does the GAB not understand?
Nov 5, 2013
GOP War on Voting Wages Across Nation
 |
| GOP to voters: You have no business here |
Scott Walker and Wisconsin Republicans know well that if voters turn out, Republicans lose elections.
In Republican land, this means the political solution is to stop voters—adding new requirements to vote, attacking early voting, and a host of other new election shenanigans the GOP is trying to rush through the legislature.
Chuck Quirmbach reports the "federal trial is underway in Milwaukee regarding the currently suspended Wisconsin law that requires voters to have a photo ID."
Civil rights v. the Republican Party, and the war is on across the country.
From Texas to Virginia to Minnesota and Wisconsin, the GOP message to voters is: Do not vote.
Rachel Maddow reports GOP officials are now openly gloating over prospects that voters will be sufficiently obstructed in November 2014 so the GOP can stay in power.
Apr 29, 2013
GOP: Stop Blacks from Voting Now
One might think this later project would tend to disconfirm the credibility of the former campaign, but not in American, pretend journalism.
African-Americans voted at a higher rate than whites in 2012 for the first time in American history, thanks to the work of civil rights groups knocking down or temporarily halting the GOP's anti-voting bills passed by the GOP (and only by the GOP) in party-line votes in states where the GOP controlled the legislature and executive.
Fearing this development of them voting, for years the GOP has fabricated phantom massive voter fraud, a lie seen as needed to justify restrictive voter IDs (other initiatives include restricting early voting, ending same-day registration; shortening poling hours, and other GOP schemes) to stop alleged voter impersonation at the polls.
No great need for this lie, politically.
The GOP could contend a massive number of space aliens are voting at the polls, argue we need restrictive anti-voter impersonation voter ID laws, and no GOP politicos would dissent, the corporate press would play along, and most people would not notice.
The American corporate media (with notable exceptions) went along with the GOP, denying that the GOP's anti-voting program is a verifiable fact, and presenting voter fraud as a problem needing a solution.
The legal justification used in the courts is the integrity of our elections.
Fortunately, we are served by the work of citizen groups, such as the Advancement Project’s Voter Protection Program, battling the GOP's war against voting. Reads the Advancement Project:
The voting booth is the one place where all are presumed equal, yet the reality is that the playing field is far from level. Citizens are still denied an equal opportunity to cast a ballot and have it counted, disproportionately voters of color. Advancement Project’s Voter Protection Program works to identify and eliminate systemic barriers to voting in the hopes of achieving a more just democracy – one in which all voices have an opportunity to be heard.Many African-Americans were offended by the GOP's effort to stop them from voting the last several years, and with the first African-American president at the top of the ticket outvoted GOP whites.
In Wisconsin, as with the national GOP and with no exception, the GOP is determined not to see this happen again.
Scott Walker, James Sensenbrenner (a voting rights poser; c'mon, you're almost 70 years old, man, time to grow up and do the right thing), and the whole GOP bunch call stopping voting "common sense," with virtually no challenge from the press.
'GOP still battling blacks and browns in effort against voting,' reads no news headline.
Why is stopping people from voting common sense in a democracy, as the GOP claims?
It's not.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)