The Kerry-Edwards campaign is preparing to launch a Voter Protection Initiative that will be nothing short of a “major effort,” according to State Senator Diane Wilkerson (D-MA), a senior campaign strategist. The project was motivated by widespread concern that Election Day 2004 could see a repeat of the Florida 2000 fiasco and dirty tricks aimed at disenfranchising voters.
Wilkerson says that “there is every indication that the full power of the government at the highest levels” is being marshaled by Republicans to enforce measures that will result in nothing short of “voter suppression.” She points to Attorney General John Ashcroft’s investigations of “potential voter fraud” and their recently reported effect of “intimidating” many voters, and notes the involvement of Republican National Committee General Counsel Jill Holtzman Vogel and Vice President Dick Cheney’s General Counsel Ginzburg.
The fact that this concern is shared by labor and the national AFL-CIO along with civil rights organizations, including the NAACP and the Advancement Project, and community-based groups, is reflected in their launch of similar voter protection programs.
The Kerry-Edwards campaign has issued a call for lawyers around the country to volunteer to work with the campaign to protect the rights of voters both before and on Election Day. The response has been tremendous and, Wilkerson says, the campaign has been “humbled and pleased” that some 30,000 attorneys have signed up to help out around the country. The campaign has also enlisted a group of heavy-hitters to craft a national strategy that includes Elaine Jones, former NAACP President and Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, Dennis Archer, former Mayor of Detroit, Ron Kirk, former Mayor of Dallas, and Duval Patrick, former First Assistant U.S. Attorney under President Bill Clinton and General Counsel for Texaco and Coca-Cola.
The tales of voters, particularly African-American and Hispanic voters, who have encountered difficulties at the polls have already surfaced in reports following recent primary elections. Wilkerson noted that according to the 2002 Help America Vote Act (HAVA), states are required to have a provisional ballot on hand for voters whose ability to cast a regular ballot has been challenged. But, instead, Wilkerson added, “states have created road blocks.”
Signs of Black and Brown voter suppression have already begun to surface. Citing potential “voter fraud” by “people coming across our borders illegally and getting jobs,” Republicans have floated a referendum in Arizona called “Protect Arizona Now” or “Proposition 200,” which would require proof of citizenship for anyone registering to vote. An AFL-CIO Tucson coordinator has reported that on Primary Day, September 7, in that state a group of men belonging to an organization identified as “Truth in Action” was checking polls “to see if illegal aliens were voting.”
By now everyone has heard Michigan State Representative John Pappageorge’s famous statement that “if we do not suppress the Detroit vote, we’re going to have a tough time in this election cycle.” The statement acknowledges the power of the African-American vote in Detroit given the fact that Blacks make up 83 percent of the city’s population. While Pappageorge later tried to clean up his statement, it didn’t escape the attention of Cecelie Counts, the AFL-CIO director of civil, human and women’s rights. Counts said simply, “That is the political reality in most of these swing states.” She added that Democrats “can’t win Ohio or Michigan or Pennsylvania without the African-American vote, without a tremendous African-American vote.” And, she says, by using census numbers, Republican strategists “can pinpoint places” where minority voters are likely to influence an election. “They know it’s Detroit. They know it’s Kansas City and St. Louis. They know it’s Las Vegas.”
There are some who see voter suppression as being so high on the Republican agenda that when they can’t enforce it they are determined to see to it that others do it for them. Wilkerson cited a New Mexico lawsuit the Republicans filed against the Secretary of State after 70,000 new, predominantly Hispanic voters were registered in that state. The Republican Party sued the Secretary of State of New Mexico, Wilkerson said, “because she refused to implement the new elevated and enhanced ID requirements.”
What are those “elevated and enhanced ID requirements”? As the AFL-CIO has repeatedly pointed out in leaflets and material targeted to the battleground states particularly, “It’s a good idea – and in some jurisdictions it may be required – to take a valid, government-issued photo ID to the polls.”
Counts has stressed the need to make sure that your name appears exactly the same on the ID you use as it does on your voter registration form. A difference of even just your middle initial, she warns, can lead to your right to vote being contested.
Wilkerson stresses that among the many things, voters will need to verify something as simple and often taken for granted as “where their voting precinct is.”
And, Wilkerson says, people need to know that they have the right to a provisional ballot.
In many cases, monitors have reported that poll workers do not tell voters they may cast a provisional ballot and election officials have refused to even count thousands of such ballots. A major election reform passed in 2000 enabled voters whose names do not appear on precinct rolls on Election Day to vote using provisional ballots and have their eligibility resolved later. But at least 16 states have restricted access to provisional ballots. In Chicago’s March primary election, officials cited state law in tossing out some 93 percent of the provisional ballots on the grounds that they were cast at the wrong precinct. Some have even reported incidents of tampering with the voter registration rolls to change voters’ addresses.
In Florida, activists in the Voter Protection Coalition – which includes the AFL-CIO, AFSCME, SEIU and civil rights allies – went to court demanding state election officials count provisional ballots as long as they were cast in the voters’ home county.
These all offer examples of why the Kerry-Edwards legal team will be needed on the ground. Wilkerson indicated that even as we speak the team is getting into place, but the Kerry-Edwards campaign will not announce their efforts until after the Thursday, September 30, debate.
Wilkerson stated: “We don’t want anything to take away from this announcement around the beginning of October. The Kerry-Edwards campaign considers this a very important issue, and we want it to get all the attention it can.”
Noting the massive voter registration drives that have been underway, Wilkerson added, “The polls continue to miss these people,” noting that estimates of the increase the registration mobilization has had on voter numbers has been impressive. “We have had some estimates in Ohio that put the increase as high as 200 percent.”
Whether these efforts will prevent what many are anticipating as a multiplicity of Florida 2000 fiascoes all around the country remains to be seen. Wilkerson thinks it will make a difference. “What we’re anticipating is a situation in 2004 where we’re better prepared in anticipation of some of the things that caught us off guard in 2000.”
