Missing the Point on Voting Rights

 

Well-meaning people who object to, and often work against voter suppression, see the importance of dirty tricks, of cheating, of elections stolen.

It is sometimes too easy to miss the most important theft of all.

Up until the breakthrough, Gregg Phillips had kind of a dodgy background. He had been a Mississippi Republican activist for years, eventually becoming head of the state’s Department of Human Services. But he had to resign a short time later over charges of conflict of interest. He was caught by alert reporters using his position for financial gain.

He migrated to Texas to join their Health and Human Services Department, but soon resigned again. Same accusation: using his position to line his own pockets.

He was accused of falsifying his educational background on government applications and of cheating on child support.

And he was chased by the IRS over unpaid taxes.

He was best known for one of the funniest tax defenses ever. He insisted he was innocent, since the IRS claimed unpaid taxes of more than 100,000 dollars, but he had only cheated the government of 50,000.

That is, he was best known for that defense until late 2016, when he tweeted this:

and this:

Almost immediately, newly elected candidate Donald J. Trump cited those internet messages as important proof, as he tweeted and talked obsessively.

President Trump, inviting congressional leaders over to the White House last night, and then talking about the election, saying he lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton because of millions of illegal votes.

David Muir reporting for ABC News

So, suddenly, Gregg Phillips became a conservative rock star. The problem was, he offered no evidence other than talk.

Do you have the proof?
Yes

Will you provide it?
Yes

Can I have it?
No

Interviewed by Chris Cuomo, CNN

Such is the foundation of what has become a pillar of conservatism as we know it today. Accusations now, evidence later, then later still, then never.

You put it out there, got picked up by all these righty sites.
It made its way to the president. He’s now putting it forth as truth. You’ve got to show what you know.
We will.

But when?
When the time is right.

Gregg Phillips has since faded, but the undocumented charges remain.

They are not new. They have been floating around without verification for half a century.

Election stealing has happened, and it remains a danger. It happens behind the scenes, where votes are counted without supervision, or where voters are turned away or intimidated.

It almost never involves voter impersonation.

Here’s why:

Penalties are harsh for anyone pretending to be someone they are not in order to vote. Anyone caught will face huge fines and prison time.

The silliest charge is that illegal immigrants are willing to come out of the shadows, pretend to be someone else, and risk prison time, then deportation, just to cast a single illegitimate vote.

The myth is not around without reason. It was the basis of a conservative operation in the early 1960s. Operation Eagle Eye targeted voting rights of mostly minority voters, as volunteers demanded that African-American and Latino voters, waiting in line, read aloud sections of law. If they did not do so with satisfactory precision, they were told they could not vote.

That practice was outlawed in 1964.

In the 1980’s, Republicans sent postcards to voters in black neighborhoods. If the postcards were not properly delivered, and those voters showed up to vote, they were told they could not. It was called voter caging, and the GOP was sued over the practice. They signed an agreement promising not to do it again. They did anyway, were taken to court again, and signed a consent decree ordering them to stop. In 2004, they started doing it again.

More recently, exact signature matching has been used. If the way a voter signs documents changes over time, that voter can be prevented from voting. A non-expert office holder gets to decide whether a signature matches.

Precise document matching is also used. If my marriage license, hunting license, water bill, or any other document differs from my voting registration, I might be told at the voting place that I cannot vote. A period or middle initial might not be included on a document. Or a dash might not be there. Any difference will do.

And, of course, there are photo ID requirements. Most folks are okay with photo IDs until they think about those who do not drive. Of course, non-driver photo IDs can be gotten. But that is often not easy for the non-driving elderly, or the disabled, or even those who ride the bus to and from work. Offices where such IDs are available are often deliberately closed at strategic times. In Ohio, one state worker was fired for volunteering to a potential voter where an office was located.

A more subtle form is voter dilution, allowing voters to, you know, vote, but making those votes count for a lot less. This is done through gerrymandering. It has been around since colonial times, but it has taken hold most forcefully in recent years.

It should be obvious that voter suppression is wrong. It strikes at the core of functional democracy. It is a secular equivalent of blasphemy.

And it is covered by news media as a serious bit of cheating by one political party against another. Rachel Maddow devoted a recent segment on gerrymandering on a state level. Good for her. Then she summarized why it was important.

As you heard there, state lawmakers across the country play a really important role, not just in how state politics work, but also how the entire US Congress looks as well.

And that is how we can so easily miss what is most important.

I’m glad that Karine Jean-Pierre went on national television to expose the evil convergence of voter suppression, vote manipulation, and voter intimidation going on in Georgia:

So it’s been a constant thing with Kemp and he’s not stopping. And the race is really close. I mean, Stacey Abrams could potentially become the first black woman elected to governor in a southern state…

Yes, we can easily miss what is most important.

I am grateful to talk show hosts Ali Velshi and Stephanie Ruhle. They devoted a segment instructing voters on how to overcome obstruction and exercise their right to vote. They included this:

Oprah said it the other day in Georgia. If you come out in numbers that are too big to tamper with, then nobody can mess with the election.

Making sure the election turns out the right way through sheer numbers.

It is inevitable, I suppose, that we are tempted to see voting rights, at least a little, through the lens of political advantage. Voter suppression does favor Republicans. The right to vote does favor Democrats.

But when Oprah Winfrey did take the stage in Georgia, she also said something much more important than that. Her message had a significance beyond whether an election will turn out the right way. She spoke about one man, during Jim Crow days in the old south, who walked for miles to vote, was turned away from one polling place after another and was finally told he could not vote.

I vote for Otis Moss Sr., a man who I never knew, who didn’t get the chance. And I vote for my grandmother Hattie Mae Lee who died in 1963 before the Voting Rights Act.

I vote for her, I vote for every relative who ever tried, who ever wanted. I vote for every person who ever imagined they could, and every slave who knew they couldn’t.

When I go and vote at the polls, I vote and stand as Maya Angelou used to say: I come as one but I stand as ten thousand, for those ten thousand who didn’t have the chance.

Oprah urged young voters to honor those who had struggled, and often died, in order that today’s voters might be allowed to exercise their right. But just as basic a message is reserved for those who stand by and witness today’s new obstruction.

It is tempting to cast the denial of basic voting rights as unfair to one political side or another. That strikes me as the least important of all the important reasons to protect the right to vote.

When conservatives, Republicans, or some future party or group seek an advantage, political or not, by interfering with basic rights, it is a crime of theft.

An election will often be at stake.
Some political balance will be changed.
Some policy will be affected.

But here is what we too often miss.

The most serious crime is against the voter, and against those who, through history, struggled and risked everything for that voter, and who too often became the strange fruit hanging from southern trees.

Any who do not object to that crime are complicit and must share the guilt.

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