ProgressiveDem: State Democratic Parties Must Openly Fight GOP Repug Voter Suppression Tactics
State Democratic Parties Must Openly Fight GOP Repug Voter Suppression Tactics
The Republican Party is well known for voter suppression; its one of the philosophical and tactical foundations of the GOP.
Elected Republican state officials weild some of the tools to implement this heinous, illegal strategy against the people and for government of, by, and for the few, the elite, the wealthy.
David Sirota writes about the latest in the battleground state of Colorado.
"Remember last week when I warned that 2008's version of Katherine Harris - Colorado Secretary of State Mike Coffman - was using his power to try to throw the election here in this swing state? Four days before the election, he's gone into overdrive. According to a breaking news story just off the wire, he has been violating federal law with his voter purges, which - despite his public assurances to the contrary - have been continuing:
A federal judge today angrily ordered Colorado Secretary of State Mike Coffman to stop purging names on the state's voter registration rolls.
The judge's order came in a telephone hearing this afternoon that was the latest clash between Coffman and a trio of advocacy groups who had sued Coffman over the purging of the voter rolls so close to the election.
Wednesday night, the two sides reached a settlement designed to ensure voters whose registrations were cancelled within the 90 days before the election wouldn't be disenfranchised on Election Day.
But state officials acknowledged today that 146 more names had been purged since the settlement was reached.
Coffman has said previously that he has followed the law and is allowed to cancel voter registrations this close to the election for a variety of reasons. Attorney General John Suthers, who, like Coffman, is a Republican, has said Coffman was legally allowed to cancel 2,454 duplicate voter registrations close to the election."
After the election Demoratic state parties and their local committees should begin the process (if they haven't already) to assure that voter suppression never happens again in any election.
Republicans should understand that the days of their party using legal system machinations and other dirty tricks to suppress voters is at an end and they will face criminal consequences if they try.
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