Milwaukee Journal Sentinel/Pat A. Robinson
The attack on the American voter.
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"Now many of our Christians have what I call the 'goo-goo syndrome.' Good government. They want everybody to vote. I don't want everybody to vote. Elections are not won by a majority of people. They never have been from the beginning of our country, and they are not now. As a matter of fact our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down."
In 1827, Edward E. Tarrant had established himself as a wealthy man, probably the wealthiest in all of Red River County. A veteran of the war of 1812, now a sheriff, he left his mark in Tarrant County Texas, the namesake of the former officer of the “fourth brigade.”
On September 29, 1843, Tarrant along with Texas state attorney general George Whitfield would draft The “Bird’s Fort Treaty.” Which surreptitiously states in Article XXIV, that; “The government of Texas has the right of working all mines that have been discovered or will be discovered on the territory of the Indians.”
Just as surreptitiously as the terms of Crystal Mason’s signed affidavit that stated she was not eligible to vote as a convicted felon, some hundred and seventy five years later in that same Tarrant County. Mason was on community service on November 8, 2016 for a her 2012 conviction on tax fraud. Only voting after the urging of her mother, Ms. Mason was sentenced to five years in prison on voter fraud charges, for a provisional ballet vote that was never counted.
Crystal Mason’s unfortunate miscarriage of justice is the oddity, not the model. The model being the strategy adopted by many incumbents on the right, while the left has historically supported voter registration initiatives, conservatives (since the voting rights act of 2013) have practiced down presser tactics with almost surgical precision. From good ol fashioned jerrymandring to voter caging and voter roll purges.
Stories like that of Crystal Mason, no matter how rare, are aggressively publicized and spun in efforts to paint a fanciful portrait of voter fraud gone wild. These trumped up horrors however, have never been substantiated.
Max Faulkner/Fort Worth Star-Telegram via Getty Images.
During the presidential campaign of 2016,
Vice President nominee, Mike Pence came under scrutiny from voter rights advocates when Indiana State police raided the voter registration office of Patriot Majority USA, in October of 2016. Indiana progressives called conspiracy on the would be VIce president.
The nonprofit Patriot Majority, had registered over 45,000 voters, mostly African American. Just one week from the voter registration deadline and 5,000 voters short of their 50,000 target at the time of the raid. Founded in 2005, PM was accused of registering voters twice, in addition to applications that had missing or unverified zip codes and addresses. This is often a problem with grassroots voter registration initiatives staffed by everyday citizens, the lack of experience, training, and in many cases, after work hours by constituents looking to supplement their income, have always bore such inconsistencies. Though well meaning, these efforts give way to questionable voter registration applications, that ones opponent will rightfully pounce.
When you open Patriot Majority’s web sight, the home page is striking. Waves of red and white stripes, the famous Washington crossing the Delaware painting emblazoned on the header. With the current political climate, rife with its suede patriotism and the far lefts deepening dive into a socialist creed, one might expect Patriot Majorities home page to spawn links to diatribes of pro gun advocacy and states rights. But PM claims to be a bipartisan movement. While it seems that the issue is the shotty work of some canvassers, Common Cause Indiana and the NAACP have filed a federal lawsuit against Marion County of Indian after the raid on charges of voter suppression by closing early voting in a sector with over 700,000 registered voters. Former Indiana governor mike Pence, now ironically, head of the Elections Integrity Commission, boasts “What is historic here is that our president-elect won 30 to 50 states. He won more counties than any candidate on our side.
The Georgia State showdown
Georgia’s Democratic candidate for governor Stacey Abrams finds herself in a historical yet tight race in Georgia’s gubernatorial midterms. The Gulfport native faces off against opponent Brian kemp, the self proclaimed “politically incorrect conservative.” The cautionary view in mid August was that Kemp could have a strong surge in the last two months leading to the peach state showdown, much like Nathan Deal in 2014. But as of reporting, the race is still in a dead heat. Kemp has been mocked for his ads that some on the left liken to a Dave Chapelle or SNL skit. But while democrats laugh, Brian Kemp is practicing more “politics as usual” than his campaign readaric may assert. Kemp’s influence on voter registration as Secretary of State should be no laughing matter to democrats.
The heat was on as the summer closed out in Randolph County Georgia, a sort of patient zero for the National attention to suspected voter suppression. The Georgia county quickly beat back a move to close seven of nine polling places in the historically black canton. But the victory, while sweet, is little to stop the suppression of voters in the rest of the state. Like Tarrant in Texas, Randolph county is named after another slave owning statesman, Ol’ John Randolph of Roanoke. A career politician who also served as prosecutor of the associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, Samuel Chase on charges of impeachment. Chase would later be acquitted by the senate. Roanoke famously stated,
“The most delicious of all privileges, spending other people’s money.” Might be proud of his states insidious politico operandi.
Several groups, including the Georgia Democratic Party, Common Cause and the NAACP, have called on Kemp to step down from his position as secretary of state while he runs for Governor.
Greg Palast, the New York based investigative journalist and author of the compelling
The best democracy money can buy, has been hunting down Kemp and also, Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach for the past several months. Armed with a Federal subpoena accusing Kobach of purging hundreds of thousands of Kansans from the voting rolls. Like his counterpart in Georgia, as Secretary of State, Kobach has oversight of the states voter rolls and similar to Brian Kemp of Georgia, Kobach has also successfully closed polling stations in low income counties as well.
As Carol Anderson of the New York Times put it, “Brian Kemp is a master of voter suppression.” For example, Kemp made a statement in 2014 regarding another lawsuit his office faced regarding over 40 thousand names of voters disappearing from the Georgia voting rolls. The Secretary of State emphasized that “The lawsuit filed by 3rd sector development, is frivolous and totally without merit. The claim that there are over forty thousand unprocessed voter registration applications, are false.” Kemp went on to contravene with the 6,525 voter applications his office found had issues of no longer being with us, had no valid date of birth, where convicted felons or provided no county or address. ( some states report day of birth instead of DOB, which substantially increases the chance of two records being reported for the same person.)
Kemp also provided a Potboiler about an application filled out by, Johnny B Cool, who’s city was listed as, Yo’ Town. While this smacks of incompetence of the registrating body or the voting applicant themselves, it seems a stretch to think that a political scenic, who would name themselves Johnny B Cool who Haile’s from Yo town would be a tactical move that any well minded voter fraud conspirator would employ. But the great voter fraud conspiracy rolls on. Kemp, by the way,
Was found to be guilty of voter suppression in 2014.
Prior to Shelby v Holder, (2013) Texas, along with the several other Jim Crow states had coordinated a preemptive lockout of minority, elderly and millennial prospective votes in anticipation of provisions 4 & 5 of the voting rights act being overturned. The first domino to fall was that unsuspecting, overlooked little Diddy called Northwest Austin Municipal Utility District No. 1 v. Holder, or the MUD case. The stories of out of town voters using the address of a local motel to vote illegally, harassment of MUD’s minority community and a strange cloud of mystery preceding the Shelby v. Holder decision, stains the “Municipal Utility District,” just north of Austin.
That was 2009, and four years later, Shelby county found it unconstitutional for the federal government to suppress their ability to molest the Hispanics, black, elderly and young voting populous. The Supreme Court would concede that, “voting discrimination still exists; no one doubts that.” But the 5-4 decision of the highest court in the land would contradict their own logic by wiping away the voting rights act protection of historically disenfranchised constituents, specifically articles 4 and 5.
But back in Tarrant Texas, and many other counties in the Lone star state, there’s been a battle raging to oppress voter turnout since voting became public freewill. Ted Cruz and Beto O’Rourke are in the mezzo of a 12 round barn burner as the country tumbles towards it’s midterms like a radioactive meteor with no direction. Could it be, the land of steers could finally be done with Ted Cruz? Or is Beto’s hype just that? Progressive turnout or conservative suffragist subterfuge may answer these questions.
And yet, one of the few cases of actual voter fraud, ironically in that same state of Texas, is more doleful than relevant. Crystal Mason began her five year sentence for voter fraud in September. After being walked through the provisional ballet process by a state appointed election official, she still stands condemned by adjudication. Alison Grinter, of Mason’s legal team explained, “the federal government has stepped over the state and found Crystal guilty of violating the law.”
In august an 11 year old child hacked a Florida electronic ballet in this years DEFCON 26,
The annual hacking convention held this year in sandy Las Vegas. Emmett Brewer and 30 other kids ranging in age from 8 - 16 years old where all able to hack Florida’s faulty system. The national association of Secretaries of State responded to DEFCON with one of many proclamations in their
(Long comment regarding a proposed Exemption under 17 U.S. code 1201)
The senate stated to ES&S, the countries largest supplier of voting machines;
“Currently there are significant barriers that prevent states from working with independent, qualified, good faith researchers to conduct cyber security on election systems.”
Now it seams, after the midterms, ES&S May have to deal with not just the Senate but the people.
But the talk is done. Bluster deflated. Red and Blue candidates enter November 6th like combatants on the world stage. Like heavyweight champions with the future of democracy on the line. I’ll be watching the fight on November 6th just like Crystal Mason.
Hoping the country does right by its future.
