BRAD BLOG: Bush Administration Guts 40 Year Old 'Voting Rights Act'! [View All]

Bush Administration Guts 40 Year Old 'Voting Rights Act'
DoJ Staff Attorneys Now Barred From Offering Opinions in VRA Cases After WaPo Exposed Political Appointees Overruled Civil Rights Division Staffers

The beloved 40 year-old Voting Right Acts, implemented by Lyndon B. Johnson after violence and death to Voting Rights activists in Selma, Alabama in 1965 has been all but gutted by the George W. Bush administration. The VRA celebrated it's 40th anniversary this summer, even as Bush's Department of Justice was destroying one of its most important measures by covert political caveat.

That gutting now appears to be becoming a still greater threat to our democracy as it is being institutionalized by recent policy changes which bar career Voting Rights staffers and attorneys in the DoJ from offering opinions on new laws that fall under the jurisdication of the VRA.

Two recent reports by Dan Eggen of the Washington Post revealed that Bush political appointees in the DoJ has overruled the recommendations of career staffers and attorneys in the Voting Rights division tasked with determining the legality of two separate laws sent to the department for "pre-approval" under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act.

In both cases, one concerning the unconstitutional Photo ID requirements in Georgia, and the other Tom DeLay's redistricting in Texas, the DoJ recommended against the new laws but were overruled by Bush appointees. And now, Eggen reports, the department is barring such opinions from being given at all!

Our democratic way of life -- and our Republic along with it -- are in very grave danger...

FULL STORY:
http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00002137.htm

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Brad Friedman
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