General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region Forums"Crosscheck" in the Crosshairs. Voting Rights Groups Challenge Electoral Purges
Using open-records requests, Al Jazeera America obtained the previously confidential Crosscheck lists of 2.1 million voters potentially accused of casting ballots in two different states in the same election, a crime punishable by 2 to 10 years in prison. The lists reveal that the supposed double voters were matched simply on first and last name, and middle initials, suffixes and Social Security numbers were ignored. Due to its shoddy methodology, the list captured far more black, Hispanic and Asian-American voters than their white counterparts, in large part because of the commonality of minority surnames.
Helen Ho, executive director for the legal advocacy group Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Atlanta, says, the investigation was a bombshell. While Hos immediate concern is protecting her communitys voters in todays tight Senate contest between Democrat Michelle Nunn and Republican David Perdue in Georgia, she is leading national groups to take action against the misuse of the Crosscheck lists. She worries that Asian-Americans, many of whom share just a few common surnames such as Chung, Lee, Patel and Kim are particularly vulnerable to Crosschecks system of using little more than first and last name to identify potential double voters. No one knew what was going on, says Ho of Georgias participation in Crosscheck.
. . .
Before mounting the stage, Barber spoke with Al Jazeera America about the Interstate Crosscheck revelations. Their computer system has already been proven to have quite a few glitches its so bad at this point of the elections to create that kind of hysteria, he said. The claim of fraud is fraudulent. What theyre afraid of is people voting one time, not people voting two times. And the more people vote one time, it means that not many people will be voting for them, for the extremists in our state.
http://projects.aljazeera.com/2014/double-voters/challenging-crosscheck.html
cilla4progress
(24,766 posts)Or only future ones?
brer cat
(24,605 posts)Not apparent that they made any progress this time around.
List left
(595 posts)ProudProgressiveNow
(6,129 posts)yurbud
(39,405 posts)even though they are the intended targets?
Coyotl
(15,262 posts)Chakab
(1,727 posts)who turn a blind eye to voter purging and suppression.
shadowmayor
(1,325 posts)Greg Palast wrote about this sinister crap being used in Florida during the 2000 election, in Ohio and other states in 2004 and more. Why hasn't the Democratic Party shone the light of truth and justice and the American way on this? Why is it still allowed to be applied so broadly? Where's the fight for these voters? Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory again. It's not like this is a surprise every four years.
OldRedneck
(1,397 posts)I"m a member of the electoral board in a small, rural Virginia county. A couple of years ago, Virginia Republicans and their mouthpiece, the Richmond Times-Dispatch were wetting their pants over a claim that 40,000 people were registered to vote in Virginia and another state.
Our registrar received a list of 131 people who supposedly were double-registered. We were required to contact these people, first by telephone then by certified letter, return receipt requested.
To make this story short, not a single one of the 113 in our county were "double-registered." Clerical errors, same name, similar name, and the like. We urged the State Board of Elections to withdraw Virginia from Crosscheck but that hasn't happened yet.
If you are a Virginian, you might consider contacting your state senator and delegate as well as the State Board of Elections and ask them to remove Virginia from Crosscheck.
Sunny05
(865 posts)Thank you, CousinIT, for posting this.
And thank you AlJazeera for investigating and reporting!
KewlKat
(5,624 posts)Persuade (with sticks if necessary) the 27 states that use this voter suppression program to STOP.
Ilsa
(61,698 posts)is on a Crosscheck list in Georgia or Virginia.
anamandujano
(7,004 posts)This information needs more coverage.