Florida Republicans Try To Disenfranchise 180,000 "Noncitizens"

[Formaldehyde]

Meet the new elections officials, same as the old elections officials?

Miami Herald: Hunt for 180,000 possible non-citizen voters exposes partisan divide

Amid an increasingly partisan dog fight, Florida elections officials say the number of potential non-citizens they’re examining on the state voter rolls is far higher than what was initially reported: 180,000.

Florida’s Division of Elections said Thursday that it’s combing through this initial, mammoth list of names -- which were flagged during a computer database search -- to make sure its list is as clean and as small as possible.

The state is then turning over smaller batches of the more-verified names to local county election supervisors, who are contacting the potential non-citizens to see if they can lawfully vote.

By the end of the process, the state could send counties as many as 22,000 names to check, one election source indicated, in a state with more than 12 million total voters.

Some Democrats accuse the Republican-appointed Secretary of State Ken Detzner of engaging in a type of “voter suppression.” But Detzner’s office said he’s trying to make sure no unlawful votes are cast -- and it indicated that Obama’s Administration is stonewalling the effort by refusing to share Department of Homeland Security databases that could more easily show who’s a citizen and who’s not.

“We have been requesting DHS access since September of last year,” said Florida’s Division of Elections spokesman, Chris Cate. “We can do our checks. But we’re restricted in the level of confirmation we can do. We need help from the federal government. But so far, we’ve been unsuccessful.”

DHS has yet to comment.

U.S. Rep. Frederica Wilson, D-Miami, said in a written statement that DHS shouldn’t cooperate.

“The Florida Republicans’ desire to use Department of Homeland Security information – which is for the purpose of thwarting terrorists and not to engage in yet another round of voter suppression – would set a dangerous precedent,” she said, “by not only taking away citizens’ constitutional right to vote but by giving state governments free rein to invade innocent Americans’ privacy.”

The effort in Florida was inspired by Colorado’s Republican Secretary of State Scott Gessler, who said last year that he initially identified a pool of 16,000 potential non-citizens voters in his state. New Mexico — also run by a Republican Secretary of State — searched and found 104.

Do you really think there are 180,000 people in Florida who would risk prison sentences just to illegally vote? Or is this just another attempt by the Republicans to deliberately disenfranchise voters they know will likely vote Democrat this October?

 

[GhostWriter16]

Well, I don't see an issue with actually investigating and finding out.

Weren't there something like 3 million illegal immigrants who voted in the 2008 election?

Regardless, the fact that you don't have to prove citizenship at the polls is pretty ridiculous.

 

[JollyRoger]

There have been very few voter fraud cases over the years. The only voter fraud I know of recently was that Republican politican in I think Indiana that voted outside his district and the James O'Keefe gang fraudulently obtaining ballots.

 

[rugbyLEAGUEfan]

Well, I don't see an issue with actually investigating and finding out

I don't think whether or not investigating is worthwhile is the issue here . It's whether or not this is a politically motivated effort to disenfranchise voters under the guise of an investigation.

 

[Leonel]

Do you really think there are 180,000 people in Florida who would risk prison sentences just to illegally vote? Or is this just another attempt by the Republicans to deliberately disenfranchise voters they know will likely vote Democrat this October?

Judging from their track record, I got good money on that last part.

 

[MobBoss]

Do you really think there are 180,000 people in Florida who would risk prison sentences just to illegally vote?

Yup. They apparently are willing to risk working illegally...ergo, break the law. Please argue that a moral laxness towards the law somehow indicates that they wouldnt be willing to break other laws..i.e. illegally vote.

Also, if the odds of them doing do would increase significantly if the election itself pertinent to them as a demograph. And since immigration issues are indeed an election hot topic, why wouldnt they risk it vote for someone favorable to them?

Or is this just another attempt by the Republicans to deliberately disenfranchise voters they know will likely vote Democrat this October?

So you are making the assumption that the non-citizens are voting democrat? Why? Isnt it in both parties interest to ensure that non-citizens dont vote?

 

[Bootstoots]

Yup. They apparently are willing to risk working illegally...ergo, break the law. Please argue that a moral laxness towards the law somehow indicates that they wouldnt be willing to break other laws..i.e. illegally vote.

Also, if the odds of them doing do would increase significantly if the election itself pertinent to them as a demograph. And since immigration issues are indeed an election hot topic, why wouldnt they risk it vote for someone favorable to them?

Because the cost-benefit analysis doesn't favor illegal voting. If a non-citizen votes and isn't caught, whoever they supported gets 1 additional vote. If they are caught, they face arrest and deportation on voter fraud charges. It isn't even remotely worth it.

 

[DroopyTofu]

If they're not citizens, then shouldn't it be obvious they shouldn't be voting? The government is doing its job in enforcing the law. I'd be more worried that democrats don't care that people break the law.

 

[Cutlass]

Yup. They apparently are willing to risk working illegally...ergo, break the law. Please argue that a moral laxness towards the law somehow indicates that they wouldnt be willing to break other laws..i.e. illegally vote.

Also, if the odds of them doing do would increase significantly if the election itself pertinent to them as a demograph. And since immigration issues are indeed an election hot topic, why wouldnt they risk it vote for someone favorable to them?



So you are making the assumption that the non-citizens are voting democrat? Why? Isnt it in both parties interest to ensure that non-citizens dont vote?

And yet there's never been any evidence of widespread voting fraud by immigrants....

 

[Formaldehyde]

Much less undocumented ones.

 

[MobBoss]

Because the cost-benefit analysis doesn't favor illegal voting. If a non-citizen votes and isn't caught, whoever they supported gets 1 additional vote. If they are caught, they face arrest and deportation on voter fraud charges. It isn't even remotely worth it.

Unless their candidate gets elected. Then its obviously worth it.

But even then, its apparently 'worth it' to those interested in soliciting such potential voters in the hopes of swinging close elections.

And yet there's never been any evidence of widespread voting fraud by immigrants....

Thats because most instances of voter fraud arent prosecuted. Dont equate a lack of prosecution with it not occuring, although that seems to be the primary tracking method used in these type of arguments.

 

[Formaldehyde]

They are obviously documented and widely publicized whether they are prosecuted or not.

Voter fraud is simply not a major problem anymore despite all the attempts by the Republicans to deliberately disfranchisement legal voters every major election.

http://dirtyhippies.org/2012/03/05/...e-wrong-statistics-fixing-the-wrong-problems/

… the Justice Department under President George W. Bush, conducted a massive investigation between 2002 and 2006. Only 120 people were charged and 86 convicted during a period when nearly 200 million votes were cast in federal elections. According to a New York Times review of the Justice Department’s efforts, just 26 of those cases involved voting by people who were ineligible, multiple voting or registration fraud — the kinds of offenses that an ID law might catch.

A 2005 report by the Brennan Center found the most common causes of voting irregularities were not people impersonating others at the polls but clerical mistakes, computer errors and instances where two people with the same or similar names were flagged as the same person voting twice. The Brennan study warned that voter ID laws are far more likely to prevent legitimate voters from casting ballots than to prevent fraud.

Of its review of the 207 contested votes cast in 2010, the commission found:

• 106 votes were clerical errors by poll workers – mistakes like marking John Doe Sr. instead of John Doe Jr.

• 56 votes were “bad data matching” – meaning the state Department of Motor Vehicles, which raised concerns about zombie voters, was wrong in assuming the voters were dead.

• 32 votes were “voter participation errors,” meaning someone was credited as voting in an election when they did not, most likely because of a stray mark on the voter rolls that was electronically scanned to record a voter’s participation.

• Three ballots were cast absentee by voters who died before Election Day.

 

[Cutlass]

Thats because most instances of voter fraud arent prosecuted. Dont equate a lack of prosecution with it not occuring, although that seems to be the primary tracking method used in these type of arguments.

We aren't talking about what is prosecuted. We are talking about what is not found. And what is not found is voter fraud, particularly by immigrants. The Bush administration hunted aggressively for voter fraud for 8 years, and found essentially none. 3 cases a year, or some trivial number like that, in the whole country. Not enough to have effected the outcome of a single election.

So given that the government has proven that the voter fraud is not taking place, how do you justify the treason of a policy that might deny an American the right to vote?

After all, letting an American vote is so overwhelmingly more important than every other issue that it's not even comparable.

 

[MobBoss]

Whether they are prosecuted or not, they are obviously documented and widely publicized.

Voter fraud is simply not a major problem anymore despite all the attempts by the Republicans to deliberately disfranchisement legal voters every major election.

I fail to see how asking people to prove who they are as a problem. Its a no-brainer, and it doesnt truly 'disenfranchise' anyone.

I also dont understand why intelligent people are against voter ID. Just doesnt make sense to me.

I guess Democrats would like to be able to return to the Tamany Hall days when you could run a guy in 3 or 4 times to vote by shaving him, or changing his clothes. Ah, the good old days, eh?

 

[emzie]

Voter ID laws are often implemented in a way that disenfranchises the very poor. It's kind of hard to imagine, but there are places in rural America that are very poor. Where my mom lives, the nearest DMV is a 50 minute drive in Bozeman, Montana. If she couldn't afford a car, how is she going to get an ID to vote?

I don't really have a problem with voter ID laws when you take into account rural areas and deeply poor people. The library here has a motor home stocked with books that they drive to rural areas of the city that don't have a local library branch. Perhaps the state can do that for IDs. If you're not willing to make these steps, then I'm going to suspect your'e not trying to deter fraud but rather suppress votes from the poor or elderly.

 

[Bootstoots]

Unless their candidate gets elected. Then its obviously worth it.

But even then, its apparently 'worth it' to those interested in soliciting such potential voters in the hopes of swinging close elections.

What does it matter if their candidate gets elected, provided the margin of victory was greater than 1 vote? Everyone knows that it is very difficult to influence the outcome of an election with a single vote. There's essentially no benefit to taking on the risk of being caught.

Thats because most instances of voter fraud arent prosecuted. Dont equate a lack of prosecution with it not occuring, although that seems to be the primary tracking method used in these type of arguments.

Voter fraud, prosecuted or not, is exceedingly rare under present conditions. See Cutlass's argument.

 

[Ayn Rand]

If you're so keen on foreigners voting in your elections then where's my vote?

 

[Leonel]

If you're so keen on foreigners voting in your elections then where's my vote?

We let foreigners donate to Super PAC's anonymously here, might as well have them vote.

 

[MobBoss]

Voter ID laws are often implemented in a way that disenfranchises the very poor. It's kind of hard to imagine, but there are places in rural America that are very poor. Where my mom lives, the nearest DMV is a 50 minute drive in Bozeman, Montana. If she couldn't afford a car, how is she going to get an ID to vote?

I don't really have a problem with voter ID laws when you take into account rural areas and deeply poor people. The library here has a motor home stocked with books that they drive to rural areas of the city that don't have a local library branch. Perhaps the state can do that for IDs. If you're not willing to make these steps, then I'm going to suspect your'e not trying to deter fraud but rather suppress votes from the poor or elderly.

Do the very poor even vote?

 

[Bootstoots]

If you're so keen on foreigners voting in your elections then where's my vote?

Go to Chicago. They're so progressive that they even let dead people vote!