Republican Voter Suppression Will Backfire

Alan Grayson was on national TV last night, discussing Republican voter suppression efforts in Florida. Here is what he said:

CENK UYGUR: All right. Now we're going to turn to Congressman Alan Grayson. He's a former Congressman from Florida and very likely to be a future Congressman from Florida. He's running again tomorrow, and it looks like he's in good shape. Congressman Grayson, thank you for joining us on the Young Turks.

ALAN GRAYSON: Thank you.

CENK: I want to talk to you about Florida. Right now Public Policy Polling has President Obama up by one point, but as you see all [these] voter suppression efforts throughout Florida, it makes you concerned, obviously. So if you get back in to Congress, is there anything you can do to make sure that the Republicans don't do this in every single election cycle?

ALAN: Yes, look, we have to expand the Voting Rights Act to make sure that the right to vote is effective. Here in Orange County, they have suppressed the early vote by cutting the days down from fourteen to eight, and it has been very effective. Early voting is 2-to-1 Democratic. It has been for many years. And by cutting down the days {of early voting}, they've cut down the votes. There are 20,000 fewer people who have voted in Orange County by early voting {this year}, because they cut down the days. Some people were still on line past midnight a few days ago here, desperate to vote.

And why do they {cut the early voting days}? Because they cut the Democratic vote. Ask yourself, "Who has to vote by mail? Who has to vote early?" It's people who work on Tuesdays. It's an affront, it's an insult to working America to cut back on these hours. We have people here in Orange County and Osceola County who have two jobs on Tuesdays. They start to work maybe 6, 7 o'clock in the morning. They don't get off until 8 or 9 at night. They have no choice. If they want to vote, they have to vote early, they have to vote by mail. And the Republicans are determined to see them not vote at all, to see that their votes are not counted.
https://secure.actblue.com/contribute/page/gopvotersuppression?refcode=Nov06DU

CENK: See Congressman Grayson, I oftentimes think that people have this disconnect where they think, "Oh, it's okay. I can vote for a Republican in my state as Governor, Secretary of State, whatever it might be. It's not going to affect national politics." But whenever we get to these elections, it winds up affecting national politics a lot, doesn't it?

ALAN: Look, this is a whole new tack by the Republicans. You'll often see them do things like vilify the undocumented, because they can't vote. They vilify teenage pregnancies; teenagers can't vote either. Here they are doing something very dangerous, very new; they are vilifying the voters. And I think it's going to backfire on them.

CENK: All right, Congressman Alan Grayson, one more question for you. Are you going to win tomorrow?

ALAN: It looks that way, we're doing very well. Look, we've run a kick-ass campaign, so you are going to see a kick-ass result.

If you want to see the video, click here.