Friday, January 18, 2008

Keeping voters free

TPMmuckracker:

Anticipating the 2008 election, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-MI) has introduced a bill to ban "vote caging," the term for a time-tested GOP vote suppression technique.

To "cage" voters, operatives send out a mass mailing with "do not forward" labels. Those names attached to addresses that bounce back are put on a challenge list, which is then used to challenge those voters when they come to the polls. GOPers in states all over the country have used the technique for decades, especially targeting mostly African-American areas. Timothy Griffin, the former aide to Karl Rove who replaced one of the fired prosecutors in Arkansas, was forced to defend his role in an alleged 2004 caging scheme when he worked for the Republican National Committee.

A number of powerful senators are backing a similar bill in the Senate, including Sens. Barack Obama (D-IL), Hillary Clinton (D-NY), and Patrick Leahy (D-VT).

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The bill is at the link.

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