Historic 2008 Election Could See Unprecedented Attempts to Bar African American Voters - "Obstacles to getting blacks to vote have always been formidable, but this year there will be barriers—some new, some long-standing—that previous campaigns have not had to face." Andrew Hacker, NY Review of Books, 9/18/08
Quest for zero voter fraud threatens legitimate ballots - "Most states impose harsh penalties for individual voter fraud (3 1/2 years in prison and a $10,000 fine in Wisconsin), which easily explains why there have been only of five convictions in Wisconsin since 2000 and less than 100 convictions nationwide." 9/15/08
How Voter ID Laws Unfairly Burden Voters And Skew The Electorate- "Partisan attempts to shape the electorate, in effect choosing the voters rather than voters choosing their own representatives, seek to impose barriers to voter participation by eligible citizens rather than creating a system that works to facilitate the foundational right of American democracy." 8/21/08
By pushing photo ID laws, Republicans aren't curbing voter fraud. They're denying Americans their legal rights - "...Paul Weyrich, one of the founding fathers of modern American conservatism, told a gathering of some 15,000 preachers at a training conference in Dallas, Texas in 1980. 'Many of our Christians have what I call the goo-goo syndrome - good government. They want everybody to vote,' Weyrich instructed the flock in comments captured on video. '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.'" 8/20/08
Voter Registration Is the New Battleground - "Numerous studies have found fraud and other voting irregularities in past elections to be infrequent and generally not prevalent enough to influence the outcomes of most contests." 8/12/08
97-year-old voter can't prove she's a citizen - "Having voted in every presidential election since 1932, it's looking unlikely that she'll be able to vote in the upcoming presidential election thanks to Arizona's voter identification requirements." 8/5/08
Fear Mongers: Virginia's GOP tries to scare new voters away from the polls - "There is not even a whiff of evidence that identity theft is taking place in Virginia under the guise of registration campaigns." 8/4/08
Barbs Traded on VA Voter Drives - "Local election officials and police...said they have found no evidence of fraud or attempts to steal personal information by...organizations trying to register voters." 7/29/08
Republican Campaign Against Likely Democratic Voters Begins - "As long as there are any expected close elections, and/or efforts on the ground to register and mobilize low-income voters, we should expect to see a propaganda campaign to blunt the effects." Lorraine Minnite, a Barnard College political scientist, 7/2/08
What Barriers Stand in Your Way to the Polls? - "Congressional hearings last year into the firings of federal prosecutors revealed just how politicized the Justice Department has become in targeting alleged voter fraud while ignoring issues of disenfranchised minorities. After five years pursuing widespread voter fraud, the department came up empty." 6/4/08
The Myth of Voter Fraud - "[L]aws that would force people to prove their citizenship before they can vote... - and others cropping up around the country - pose a serious threat to democracy and should be stopped." 5/13/08
The Republican War on Voting Rights - "According to The League of Women Voters, the following do not have photo identification: 11% or as many as 21 million Americans, 36% of voters in Georgia over the age of 75, 18% of Americans over 65 (6 million), 25% of African Americans, 10% of 40 million people with disabilities, 15% of low income voters." 5/5/08
The Republican War on Voting - "Voter fraud is actually less likely to occur than lightning striking a person, according to data compiled by New York University's Brennan Center for Justice." 4/1/08
Campaign Against Alleged Voter Fraud Fuels Political Tempest - "As more information becomes available about the administration's priority on combating alleged, but not well substantiated, voter fraud, the more apparent it is that its actions concerning voter ID laws are part of a partisan strategy to suppress the votes of poor and minority citizens." Joseph Rich, chief of U.S. Justice Department's Civil Rights Division until he departed in 2005, 4/19/07
In 5-Year Effort, Scant Evidence of Voter Fraud - "[T]he Justice Department has turned up virtually no evidence of any organized effort to skew federal elections, according to court records and interviews." 4/12/07
Phony Fraud Charges - "In partisan Republican circles, the pursuit of voter fraud is code for suppressing the votes of minorities and poor people. By resisting pressure to crack down on 'fraud,' the fired United States attorneys actually appear to have been standing up for the integrity of the election system." 3/16/07