You just keep telling the truth, Senator Lena Taylor!
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You are a Outstanding sen, I am watching you out west in Los angeles. Great job Thomas Brown
Hi Thomas. Welcome to 3 Chics. Sen Lena Taylor is phenomenal. The Dems are fighting for their state and their constituents. Loving it.
Pingback: Voter Suppression 2012: Wisconsin and Florida Editions - Jack & Jill Politics
thank you so much…we have to spread the word
You see that mofo didn’t cut off Lena Taylor’s presentation. Better recognize!
“Wisconsin Republicans have long pushed unsuccessfully for a photo identification requirement at the polls, citing the need to guard against voter fraud. So it was not a surprise when the incoming Senate majority leader, Republican Scott Fitzgerald, told reporters a photo ID bill would be the first introduced in 2011. But a recent Fitzgerald statement in defense of photo ID, made to a Green Bay journalist, was an eyebrow raiser.”
“A Green Bay Press-Gazette editorial on Dec. 9, 2010 quoted Fitzgerald saying: “We continue to see these isolated incidents of people trying to vote five, six times a day; people voting based on some sort of fraudulent documentation that’s offered…People think it’s important they have open, good, solid, free elections.”
“Fitzgerald’s allegation that people are voting up five or six times in one election is one we have not heard before. Is that really going on? We turned to Fitzgerald’s office, where spokesman Andrew Welhouse couldn’t cite a specific case. Instead, he said there might be cases in other states. But those cases, an anonymous allegation in Oregon and a claim in Alabama, have not been proved.”
“‘As for Wisconsin, Welhouse mentioned the episode in the 2000 presidential election when a Marquette University student claimed he voted four times. But he said Fitzgerald was not necessarily referring to that — though he offered that it’s the ‘strongest case.'”
“Finally, Welhouse referenced a Milwaukee Police Department report on the 2004 elections in the city of Milwaukee — an election plagued by vote-count discrepancies, documented by the Journal Sentinel, and allegations of voter-registration fraud.”
“Let’s pause for some context. Wisconsin’s system, which does not require voter ID and allows same-day registration, is one of the most open in the country. Supporters say this helps Wisconsin consistently rank among the states with the highest voter turnout. Critics say that leaves the system more vulnerable to fraud.”
“Republicans have pushed photo ID as a solution, but Democrats say its overkill and could discourage voting. We are not analyzing that argument here. Additionally, law enforcement officials say cases of fraud are easier to establish than to prosecute. That is, they may identify suspicious cases, but not be able to determine who was responsible. Thus, measures based on how many cases of fraud are ultimately prosecuted, or lead to convictions, give only a partial picture of what may be happening.”
“Conversely, investigators emphasize that in many cases where documents show an irregularity, the problem turns out not to be multiple voting but routine recording errors by clerks. This item is not aimed at establishing how much or how little fraud there is. Rather, it is looking strictly at Fitzgerald’s statement about people who attempt to vote five or six times.”
“Let’s look first at the 2000 incident involving the MU student, since Fitzgerald is hanging his hat mostly on that — to the degree he has evidence to hang his hat on.
The episode, which drew national media attention, started on campus after scores of students responding to a Marquette Tribune survey claimed they had voted at least twice. One student’s name emerged: Rob Bosworth, 18, told reporters for the Journal Sentinel that he voted four times at the same polling place in Milwaukee. But Bosworth’s claims did not hold up when examined by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.”
“And after a five-week investigation, the Milwaukee County district attorney’s office found no evidence supporting it. Bosworth, who had gained national publicity, later recanted his story. The DA’s inquiry examined voting records for hundreds of MU students and found no double voting. McCann concluded that the student survey had drawn “apparently unfounded, spoof responses. No one was charged.”
“Another piece of evidence cited by Welhouse was the Milwaukee Police Department report on the flawed 2004 election. It outlined absentee ballots never counted and poll workers allowing people clearly from outside the city to vote in Milwaukee.
Police investigators, though, found almost no evidence supporting the GOP’s claims of double voting and invalid addresses in that election.”
“There are, however, well-documented if isolated instances of double-voting — or alleged double voting — in Wisconsin. Perhaps most memorably, Donovan Riley, a retired attorney running for state Senate, voted in Chicago and in Wisconsin in the 2000 presidential election. He was convicted in 2006.”
“More recently, a Milwaukee couple, Herb and Suzanne Gunka, were charged with voting by absentee ballot and at a polling place in the 2008 presidential election. They have pleaded not guilty and are awaiting trial; Herb Gunka says he voted on election day because he feared that his absentee ballot was not being counted.”
“Currently, investigators in Minnesota and Wisconsin are checking into possible cross-state double voting from 2008. And a task force set up by local, state and federal officials in 2008 has filed double-voting allegations in two cases, including the Gunka case.”
“Most of the election-fraud cases charged in recent years involve voting by felons who are ineligible, or voter-registration fraud by groups, officials say. Not cases where individuals voted repeatedly, which is what Fitzgerald focused on. To make sure we weren’t missing any cases of people voting more than twice, we talked to 10 state, county and local elections officials, and law enforcement officers at the local and federal level.”
“None of the officials reported a case of voting more than two times. They said they couldn’t be totally sure that a local case had escaped their attention, but Reid Magney, a spokesman for the state office overseeing elections, said it was extremely unlikely.”
“In Fitzgerald’s home base, Juneau in Dodge County, election official Jane Fude said vote fraud was not a problem in a small town. “We know who you are, where you live, where your parents live and what time you got home last night,” Fude said.
“It’s too early to say what fraud cases may emerge from the fall 2010 elections because records are still being checked, officials said.”
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“We rate his statement False.”
http://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/statements/2010/dec/23/scott-fitzgerald/wisconsin-state-sen-scott-fitzgerald-says-some-peo/
If you come across the transcript to Lena Taylor’s speech on voter suppression, can you post a link? Thanks!
Well, they went ahead and passed the bill. No surprise there…
“Only five Democratic state senators had a chance to vote on Wisconsin’s voter ID bill before Republican Sen. Michael Ellis gaveled it through Thursday. The bill, which passed on a 19-5 vote, would require that voters present a photo ID before voting. Opponents of the bill say it infringes on the rights on minorities who are less likely to have a photo ID.”
“There is some racism in this bill,” Democratic state Sen. Spencer Coggs reportedly said.
http://videocafe.crooksandliars.com/david/wisconsin-senate-republicans-ram-through-vot
Racism? What racism? We’re supposedly living in a new and improved “colorblind” society now. And we have a black president to prove it…(sigh)
Dirty muthafuckas! Cutting off the speaker before he’d finished.
That sister read them their rights! And she’s officially on record doing so. I’m going to keep an eye on Wisconsin to see what happens after they take this vote. The people of Wisconsin do not take their rights for granted, which is why they marched en masse about their collective bargaining rights. They didn’t sit around complaining or waiting to be organized. They passed the word and got it done.
Mad props to Senator Lena Taylor!
Senator Lena Taylor threw down the GAUNTLET. Senator Riser go cut off like a bad weed from the garden. The GOP are a disgrace to American democracy.
GOP legislative aide under investigation for voter fraud
DEE J. HALL
Posted: Friday, May 20, 2011 7:00 am
A Republican legislative aide is under investigation for possible vote fraud after she cast her ballot in the November election in Onalaska although she lives in Madison.
La Crosse County District Attorney Tim Gruenke said he has forwarded the report from the Onalaska Police Department to Dane County District Attorney Ismael Ozanne to see if criminal charges are warranted against Marcie Malszycki, 30, an aide to state Rep. Warren Petryk, R-Eleva.
Records from the Government Accountability Board show Malszycki voted in Onalaska on Nov. 2, 2010, and Nov. 4, 2008, at the same time she had a home in Madison and worked at the state Capitol. Messages left with Malszycki by email, phone and Facebook weren’t returned.
Before the November election, Malszycki worked on the campaign of 92nd Assembly District candidate Dennis Clinard. The district lies just northeast of Onalaska.
Gruenke said he believes state law requires the case be handled in Dane County. Ozanne said he is researching which office has jurisdiction.
Petryk, Malszycki’s boss, is one of several co-sponsors of the controversial voter ID bill that passed the Senate Thursday.
In a post on Facebook the day of the 2010 general election, Malszycki said she had voted for GOP candidates Scott Walker, Ron Johnson, Dan Kapanke, Mike Huebsch and J.B. Van Hollen and planned to return to her South Side neighborhood the next day.
Former Dane County Sup. Patrick DePula challenged Malszycki’s right to vote in Onalaska on her Facebook page then posted the exchange on his blog last month. A Madison man read the blog and filed a complaint.
Under state law, “a person who moves to another location for a temporary purpose is not eligible to vote there,” said Diane Lowe, the lead elections specialist for the GAB. “At times, it is difficult to ascertain whether a person has an intent to return from whence they came or not.”
However, the Facebook posting suggests “that this person was fully aware that her stay in Onalaska was only temporary; she, therefore should have voted from her Madison address,” Lowe said.
According to the Onalaska police report, Malszycki voted after her mother signed an affidavit saying she had lived at her home for two months. Residents must live in a district for 10 days to be eligible to vote. Malszycki told an Onalaska police officer that a pollworker told her it would be OK to vote and that “her intent that day was to cast a vote, not do anything wrong,”
http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/elections/article_ede5d49e-8272-11e0-a6e0-001cc4c03286.html
This article was published in 2007:
“WASHINGTON, April 11 — Five years after the Bush administration began a crackdown on voter fraud, the Justice Department has turned up virtually no evidence of any organized effort to skew federal elections, according to court records and interviews.”
“Although Republican activists have repeatedly said fraud is so widespread that it has corrupted the political process and, possibly, cost the party election victories, about 120 people have been charged and 86 convicted as of last year.”
“Most of those charged have been Democrats, voting records show. Many of those charged by the Justice Department appear to have mistakenly filled out registration forms or misunderstood eligibility rules, a review of court records and interviews with prosecutors and defense lawyers show.”
“In Miami, an assistant United States attorney said many cases there involved what were apparently mistakes by immigrants, not fraud.
In Wisconsin, where prosecutors have lost almost twice as many cases as they won, charges were brought against voters who filled out more than one registration form and felons seemingly unaware that they were barred from voting. One ex-convict was so unfamiliar with the rules that he provided his prison-issued identification card, stamped “Offender,” when he registered just before voting.”
“A handful of convictions involved people who voted twice. More than 30 were linked to small vote-buying schemes in which candidates generally in sheriff’s or judge’s races paid voters for their support.”
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“Mistakes and lapses in enforcing voting and registration rules routinely occur in elections, allowing thousands of ineligible voters to go to the polls. But the federal cases provide little evidence of widespread, organized fraud, prosecutors and election law experts said. “There was nothing that we uncovered that suggested some sort of concerted effort to tilt the election,” Richard G. Frohling, an assistant United States attorney in Milwaukee, said.
“Richard L. Hasen, an expert in election law at the Loyola Law School, agreed, saying: “If they found a single case of a conspiracy to affect the outcome of a Congressional election or a statewide election, that would be significant. But what we see is isolated, small-scale activities that often have not shown any kind of criminal intent.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/12/washington/12fraud.html
Someone needs to explain to me why individuals who have been released from prison are not allowed to vote? Who gets to decide that?
What’s that all about? Other than the disenfranchisement of men of color….