Steal the Vote 2004, part 9
Like Florida in 2000, Ohio is the state the Republicans seem to concentrate most of their effort on, because Bush and KErry are in a dead heat there and the state could swing the election either way. Not surprising then that the most blatant incidents come from Ohio. The Washington Post has a good overview of some of the trouble brewing in Ohio, which contains the follwoing nuggets:
Republicans have already filed 35,000 challenges to voters’ eligibility and are preparing to send recruits into 8,000 polling places next Tuesday to challenge other voters they suspect are not eligible, particularly hundreds of thousands of the newly registered. Democrats are alarmed at the effort, saying it could tie up voting and keep many away from the polls.
[…]
Ohio law states that a party can challenge a voter’s eligibility if the challenger has a reasonable doubt that the person is a citizen, is at least 18, or is a legal resident of the state or the county where he shows up to vote. The law also states that local election boards must give voters challenged before Election Day three days’ notice before holding a mandatory hearing, no later than two days before the election.
[…]
Republicans have pointed to what they contend is widespread evidence of fraud in voter registration. Making the rounds on the Sunday talk shows, for instance, Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie pointed out that in Franklin County, the latest Census shows there are more registered voters than there are age-eligible residents.
Take good notice of the sentence I’ve emphasised, because that is something you are going to hear or are already hearing a lot from Republicans: the accusation that it’s the Democrats who are involved in voter fraud, by actually registrering people to vote. Don’t be fooled by this: they can dress it up as nicely as they want, the crux of the matter is that the Democrats want as many people as possible to vote, while the Republicans only want their people to vote.