A federal appeals court has ordered Ohio's top elections official to set up a system by Friday to verify new voters' eligibility.
The full 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati has upheld an earlier ruling that Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner has to use other government records to check the thousands of new voters for registration fraud.
Ohio Republicans sued Brunner, a Democrat.
Ohio GOP Chairman Bob Bennett calls the ruling a victory for the election's integrity. A spokesman for Brunner could not immediately be reached for comment. Brunner previously said there was no way to set up the system with such speed.
The full decision is here, in PDF format. Here are some highlights:
"So far as this record is concerned, the Secretary has given no tenable exlanation why her current interpretation of the statute, as opposed to the office's prior implementation of the law, remotely furthers the anti-fraud objective of the law."
The Ohio Republican Party's position is "not only sensible but it is also fair - and it also furthers both objectives of [the Federal Help America vote Act] ..."
The secretary's argument is a "bureaucrat's lament" that "raises more questions than it answers."
Close to one in every three newly registered Ohio voters will end up on court-ordered lists being sent to county election boards because they have some discrepancy in their records, an elections spokesman said Wednesday.
Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner estimated that an initial review found that about 200,000 newly registered voters reported information that did not match motor-vehicle or Social Security records, Brunner spokesman Kevin Kidder said. Some discrepancies could be as simple as a misspelling, while others could be more significant.
The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati sided with the Ohio Republican Party on Tuesday and ordered Brunner to set up a system that provides those names to county elections boards. The GOP contends the information will help prevent fraud.
"Things already are in motion to comply," Kidder said. "We're working to establish these processes on how we can make this work. The computer work actually began last week."
About 666,000 Ohioans have registered to vote since January.
Brunner previously cross-checked new-voter registrations with databases run by the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicle and the Social Security Administration and made the results available online, but the 6th Circuit said the information was not accessible in a way that would help county election boards ferret out mismatches.
Brunner, a Democrat, told The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer on Wednesday that she is concerned the court decision is a veiled attempt at disenfranchising voters. Brunner said she'll urge counties not to force these people to use provisional ballots.
The court gave Brunner until Friday to get election boards the information but it was unclear whether that deadline would be met. The court set no penalty for missing the deadline.
County election officials were trying to determine Wednesday how they will respond once they get the information.
"I'm very concerned with these new requirements as we get closer to Election Day," said Steve Harsman, director of the Montgomery County Board of Elections in Dayton. He said his staff already is working 16 hours a day, seven days a week.
"It's clearly going to have an impact in regard to resources we have to expend to resolve discrepancies," said Jeff Hastings, chairman of the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections in Cleveland.
"We've had about 100,000 (registrations) since January and of those about 34,000 since the primary. We will do whatever is required of us."
Also Wednesday, the Ohio Republican Party said it has filed public records requests with all 88 counties for copies of forms submitted by newly registered voters, especially those who registered and cast an absentee ballot on the same day during a one-week window earlier this month.
Brunner has said that 13,141 Ohioans registered and voted immediately during the window.
"We've seen reports of fraudulent registrations, and we want to see those forms first-hand," said Jason Mauk, the state GOP's executive director.
So she would rather have election fraud than disenfranchised voters? If someone doesn't care enough about their vote than to straighten out the mistake they made they likely aren't that committed to their choice. If someone went to the trouble of making a false registration and submitting a fraudulent ballot and changing the election you have democracy robbed from America.
Charlie Crist says the GOP "may be exaggerating claims of voter fraud". At least Charlie Crist is being honest about something:
Quote:
Florida's governor says his fellow Republicans may be exaggerating claims of voter fraud in the state.
Gov. Charlie Crist said Wednesday that he has confidence in Secretary of State Kurt Browning, who says there's only been a scattering of isolated incidents.
Crist said in the closing days of any campaign "there are some who sort of enjoy chaos." There may be more of that going on than fraud, he said.
I won't. I love my country, it won't change no matter the outcome. Even if Obama changes the name to the People Republic Of Islam, the memory of this great nation will live inside me forever.
The FBI is investigating whether the community activist group ACORN helped foster voter registration fraud around the nation before the presidential election.
A senior law enforcement official confirmed the investigation to The Associated Press on Thursday. A second senior law enforcement official says the FBI was looking at results of recent raids on ACORN offices in several states for any evidence of a coordinated national scam.
Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because regulations forbid discussing ongoing investigations particularly so close to an election.
So ACORN. What’s the deal with ACORN? ACORN does many things, including Voter Registration Drives. They hire mostly poor people to sign up voters. ACORN works to verify each and every Registration Card. ACORN flags and “packages” “incomplete and suspicious” Registrations BEFORE turning them into election supervisors who must verify or reject those registrations. By law ACORN must turn in ALL Voter Registration cards, whether they are complete or fake. ACORN spends millions of dollars verifying voter registrations PRIOR to turning them in to Election Supervisors and labels any Registration Cards that are even questionable. These are the Registration Cards Republicans are pointing to in horror.
In addition, ACORN fires employees who complete fraudulent registrations and turns them into the authorities. It is precisely how Republicans are able to identify ACORN workers who created fraudulent registration cards. By this I mean ACORN turned them in themselves!
McHate will stand there and pick up on his new cause, a completely contrived controversy stirred up by the Rove “plants” that took over the US Attorneys’ offices after the Purge of the Prosecutors. Remember that at least 3 US Attorneys were FIRED for investigating ACORN and finding no “voter fraud” in 2004.
FOX apparently now is the 24 hour ACORN channel. Desperate.
Um I think paying homeless people with cigarettes and actually driving them to go and vote when they have no idea what they are doing is a little desperate too.
a bunch of college kids who never lived in Ohio and never will registered and voted all using the same address. The one kid has been in England the whole time studying at Oxford. I hope he can explain his felony conviction to his future employers because that is what is going to happen. Fucking asshole.
Well, well, well, it looks like, contrary to whomod's apologism, the multiple registrations are tied to casting illegal votes:
Nash had caught the attention of election workers after he submitted multiple voter-registration cards - using somebody else's address - through ACORN canvassers.
Election officials caught on, contacted Nash and told him to stop registering. But the flamboyant con artist apparently ignored the warning.
On Sept. 30, officials said, Nash showed up at the election offices and re-registered to vote, again using a phony address. He then cast a ballot.
Eagle-eyed election workers recognized Nash's name and flagged his paper ballot.
On Monday, the election board said the vote would be tossed - and the case is now in the hands of local prosecutors.
The Supreme Court(Liberal Breyer) sided with Jennifer Brunner and said they don't have to check the new registrations. I guess that is the end of that. If Obama wins Ohio I hope it will be by at least 250,000 votes just so there is no disputing it.
Ohio is long since gone to Obama. Too many people are ignorant of the greater picture and only hear cutsie sound clips and media condescention toward McCain and Palin. They all want "free" health care and those wonderful tax cuts Obama says we're getting.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court is siding with Ohio's top elections official in a dispute with the state Republican Party over voter registrations.
The justices on Friday overruled a federal appeals court that had ordered Ohio's top elections official to do more to help counties verify voter eligibility.
Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, a Democrat, faced a deadline of Friday to set up a system to provide local officials with names of newly registered voters whose driver's license numbers or Social Security numbers on voter registration forms don't match records in other government databases.
Ohio Republicans contended the information for counties would help prevent fraud. Brunner said the GOP is trying to disenfranchise voters.
You know McCain is almost certainly going to lose. I suppose the only thing you people have left is to try to de-legitimize Obama's victory.
Here's what former U.S. Attorney David Iglesias had to say. He's actually a former U.S. Attorney because he was fired in the scandal that engulfed the Department of Justice last year (a story broken by the crew at TPM.) Iglesias was fired after intervention by U.S. Senator Pete Domenici and that butch dykeish looking Rep. Heather Wilson. The reason is that he wouldn't investigate bogus voter fraud charges.
David Iglesias says he's shocked by the news, leaked today to the Associated Press, that the FBI is pursuing a voter-fraud investigation into ACORN just weeks before the election.
"I'm astounded that this issue is being trotted out again," Iglesias told TPMmuckraker. "Based on what I saw in 2004 and 2006, it's a scare tactic." In 2006, Iglesias was fired as U.S. attorney thanks partly to his reluctance to pursue voter-fraud cases as aggressively as DOJ wanted -- one of several U.S. attorneys fired for inappropriate political reasons, according to a recently released report by DOJ's Office of the Inspector General.
Iglesias, who has been the most outspoken of the fired U.S. attorneys, went on to say that the FBI's investigation seemed designed to inappropriately create a "boogeyman" out of voter fraud.
Strong words from someone who knows.
Here's the bottom line. Obama is almost certainly going to win this election. The Republican party has disgraced itself these past 8 years with a bogus war and unlimited corruption and now during this election with their continued thuggery in the face of overwhelming demand by the public for change. Change from their policies and leadership that brought us a disastrous war and economic ruin. And trying to gin up a fake scandal in order to try to obfuscate the fact that no one in America, save for the FOX news loonies, likes you guys anymore isn't going to change that.
The Clinton Impeachment and the shit you guys pulled in 2000 set this country back 20 years. With that said Congratulations Obama won. Stop worrying so much!
Don't know if this has already been debunked here, but Obama never trained ACORN.
Originally Posted By: the G-man
OBAMA: ACORN WILL SHAPE MY AGENDA<p><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/8vJcVgJhNaU&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/8vJcVgJhNaU&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br />Yeah, that's right, the same ACORN that is continually in trouble for voter fraud, the same ACORN that has pushed the subprime mortgage crisis that has destabilized our economy, is, in the words of Barack Obama, going to shape our national agenda.
Jason E. Perkins annoyed Moderator Don't tase me, bro! 15000+ posts Fri Oct 17 2008 02:24 PM Reading a post Forum: Politics and Current Events Thread: Ohio voter fraud
Don't know if this has already been debunked here, but Obama never trained ACORN.
Originally Posted By: the G-man
OBAMA: ACORN WILL SHAPE MY AGENDA<p><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/8vJcVgJhNaU&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/8vJcVgJhNaU&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br />Yeah, that's right, the same ACORN that is continually in trouble for voter fraud, the same ACORN that has pushed the subprime mortgage crisis that has destabilized our economy, is, in the words of Barack Obama, going to shape our national agenda.
This is untrue as well.
Originally Posted By: Pariah
When is McCain gonna go viral with this? After Obama said he had no other relationship with Acorn than when he represented them in court, I was expecting McCain to pull this out of his hat, but NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! McCain is too concerned with looking like a guy who can get by on platitudes.
This is not voter fraud, this is registration fraud -- and ACORN reports these registrations to the authorities. ACORN is required to turn in all the registrations it receives, whether those registrations are good, bad or incomplete. This is something that the "voter fraud" advocates never seem to mention.
Voter fraud includes acts such as removing voters from the rolls because the name on the registration doesn't exactly match the name on the driver's license (as ironically is the case with "Joe The Plumber" The stupid fuck can be challenged because his name on record contains a typo), or because the picture on the license doesn't exactly match the person. Or denying the right to vote to military personnel stationed overseas, or to college students who don't live with their parents.
All of these tactics have reportedly been tried, and are reportedly still being tried, by the Republican Party -- the same people who are trying to blame ACORN for doing what it is required by law to do.
You know he was talking to thousands of community organizers and telling those thousands of community organizers that COMMUNITY ORGANIZERS would have a voice in his administration, yes?
Also, you might wanna try actually reading whomod's post above, instead of ignoring the key points he brought up.
Just a suggestion, of course.
P.S.: Thanks for stealing my thunder, whomod *winking smiley*
So she would rather have election fraud than disenfranchised voters? If someone doesn't care enough about their vote than to straighten out the mistake they made they likely aren't that committed to their choice. If someone went to the trouble of making a false registration and submitting a fraudulent ballot and changing the election you have democracy robbed from America.
Actually, what she's proposing makes sense.
1. As whomod said, it's registration fraud (which, by the way, happens every election cycle), not voter fraud as the Republicans have mislabeled it. Yes, registration fraud is a bad thing and must be avoided, but the fact is that registration fraud very rarely translates to any form of voter fraud. It won't sway the election.
2. Voters are often disenfranchised for reasons other than not having the correct information on their registration cards. For example, Republicans want to push a verification process that's been shown to disenfranchise one in four voters off the bat. People have been disenfranchised because they shared names with convicted felons.
what she is saying makes sense to a point now. Yes it will be hard to go through all of them. But like in 2000 people will volunteer to make sure it is done properly. But what a lot of people are glossing over is there was an auotmatic link that linked all voter registrations to a Federal Database and State database that works with DMV and other departments. So this way to check is very simple it is done by computer. But she turned the link off the week before early voting started. It is fucked up and if it was happening to Obama it would be causing an uproar bigger than the 2000 election. But in the end I really am not going to lose that much sleep over it because I believe Obama may lose the entire election by a wide margin. I don't trust the polls and neither does the Obama camp. It is going to be an exciting night I just wish that we could stop all this BS with the voting. Hopefully the handfull of people that they have already caught red handed commiting voter fraud by the way none of them voted for McCain will be prosecuted very very harshly......to send a message to the other coup leaders.
And if she just fucking allowed them to check all of them 2 1/2 weeks ago when they first asked they would have had over a month to check them all.....more than enough time. Nobody is saying we don't want people to vote we just want a fair election.
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