ACORN Smears Setting the Stage for Possible Post-Election Lawsuits

With an historic Election Day coming tomorrow, it is increasingly clear that the McCain-Palin campaign’s ACORN-voter fraud endgame may be to use their relentless attacks as a justification for a wave of legal challenges to close election results in key states. Over the weekend, McCain-Palin campaign manager Rick Davis made the rounds of the Sunday news shows claiming that polls showed McCain “structurally tied” in New Mexico, Colorado and Nevada. Never mind that, as SilentPatriot at Crooks and Liars points out,

“In Nevada, Barack Obama leads in the last eight polls, with a margin between 4 and 12 points.

In Colorado, excluding John Zogby's garbage internet polls, Barack Obama has lead in every single poll taken since the end of September. What's more, the most recent PPP poll has him up a staggering 10 points.

And in New Mexico, Obama leads in every poll since the second week in September. The last four polls average out to a 10.5 [point] Obama lead.”

Campaigns historically make claims of pushing towards victory on the closing weekend before an election, but the McCain-Palin campaign and the Republican National Committee have been engaged in six weeks of smears and attacks on ACORN’s record-breaking voter registration work, all part of a coordinated effort to cast doubt on the integrity of the election.

As Wade Henderson, President of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights told the New York Times on October 26th: “There is a real concern that the courts will be asked once again to weigh in on tight races where the losing party may seek to raise real questions about the legitimacy of the vote…You can’t help but conclude that this is an effort to lay a foundation for a subsequent challenge to an Obama victory, should it occur.”

Two weeks earlier elections expert Rick Hasen at Loyola Law School said something much the same in the Huffington Post,  “For the last three elections, Republicans have been ramping up cries of voter fraud as a way of undermining the legitimacy of the election results should they not turn out in their favor...”

And just last week, the Washington Independent reported, “Even when the challenges fail, Republican officials persist in their claims of voter fraud in what appears to be an effort to lay the groundwork for challenging the outcome of Election Day.”

But even Ronald Michaelson, member of the McCain-Palin “Honest and Open Election Committee” admitted over the weekend to The Politico,

“‘Do we have a documented instance of voting fraud that resulted from a phony registration form? No, I can’t cite one, chapter and verse,’ he said.… Asked whether his own party was responsible for fostering that perception, Michaelson said, ‘Well, it doesn’t help. It has captured the attention of a lot of people.’ Why do it, then? ‘Maybe it’s because there’s nothing else to talk about,’ he said.’”

So where does that leave us? Adam Serwer, writing in The American Prospect (and also a blogger over at Jack and Jill Politics) notes that these accusations allow “the conservative media machine to cast doubt on the results of the election should Barack Obama win.” In other words, these attacks are a prelude to a concerted effort by conservatives, the GOP, and the McCain-Palin campaign to manufacture an “election integrity” crisis and use that pretense for a possible all-out fight to contest tomorrow’s results.

Progressives must be ready to fight back. This election has brought millions of new voters into the process and energized millions more who have sat out previous opportunities to make their voices heard. The franchise itself is a right secured with the blood freedom fighters from past generations.

Millions of low-income people, people of color, and young people are reshaping the American Electorate. We cannot, indeed, we must not back down from any attempt to undermine the integrity of the election process itself through crises manufactured out of the whole cloth of baseless attacks on voter participation programs targeted towards underrepresented populations groups.

We are on the cusp of history and we owe it to ourselves and the people who came before us to ensure that this election reflects the will of the people.

Election protection resources and information for Election Day can be found in several places, including 1-866-OUR-VOTE, the Election Protection Wiki, and vote411.org.

*A fantastic thing about the Netroots is how great minds think alike. As I was composing this post today, two other folks jumped on this topic: David Neiwert at Crooks and Liars and John Aravosis at AmericaBlog, so I wanted to make sure people saw their posts as well.

Comments

[UltraClassic]

What's good for the goose is good for the, well, you know how that goes. What do you expect?

[dphilip]

Damn, where did the republicans get this desperate and crazy idea from??

OH, AL Gore!

[SpoxLogic]

Hate to break it to ya, dphilip, but it's not from Gore. The GOP won in 2000 by throwing out over 50,000 votes in two counties - Broward and Jacksonville. They want to try and do the same again in 2008. Hence all this talk about ACORN.

This is a tried and true method of election stealing the GOP have been doing for a few GE cycles now.

[dphilip]

Yeah well if the democrat's definition of "disenfrachising voters" is not letting Acorn produce as many votes as the democrats need to win, then I guess you would see it that way.
The democrats have gone so far down the road of creating their own realities that they now have no way back.

[dphilip]

If Obama wins, and minorities now have the representation that they have always dreamed of, (and I would truly understand their joy) isn't it time that they start being required to play on an even field? Do you think we can do away with the double standard of, that they can get away with saying and doing the most outrageous and blatant things just "because".
Don't you think they should come into the mainstream and quit requiring that exceptions be made in all aspects of society and get beyond the unspoken but required "special considerations"??

[dphilip]

Late breaking news, they are trying to suppress military votes in Virgina as we speak..

You're some fine folks..

[torrrep]

I've got news for you. Following election laws is NOT election stealing. Thinking that it's o.k. to ignore election laws IS election stealing.

[kemo5]

I made my occasional visit to FoxNews.com, and saw the front page link "Government on High Alert for Voter Fraud". The article is all about concerns for voting machine problems.

But that isn't what the link suggests at all.

[RevSpaminator]

I love the Republican trick of making accusations and then citing their own accusations as a basis of truth. One hand washes the other, right?

[Sarahjan]

Gcw

I live in Canada. I am a naturalized Canadian. Voting system is so nonpolitical in Canada in comparison to the US. It is run by an independent agency and I have never seen anything like what is taking place in the US. The US needs to fix its democracy more urgently than its economy.

[prostock69]

I couldn't agree more.

[gcw]

There are many good things we can learn from you Canadians including emulating your reasonably nonpolitical voting system. And health care, thank you very much. You have that one covered much better than we do, and that's a fact.

[torrrep]

Yeah. That's why thousands of people are streaming across the border to get medical treatment. Because they can't get it in Canada due to the long wait.

[Sarahjan]

thank you Bertha for this update. John McCain made strong and damning allegations of historic voter fraud against ACORN. He is a sitting senior senator and a candidate for the highest public office in the land: The President of the United States. Hence, his charges against ACORN, if proven to be false, have profound implications for democracy, human rights and race relations in the United States. During this campaigns most people talked about the economy and the war on Iraq but for those of us who are live outside United States, it is clear the US election system is broken and needs a complete overhaul. The US needs independent elections board similar to Elections Canada to conduct presidential, congressional and senatorial elections.

[gcw]

Seems to me that Canada, for example, has a much better way of registering voters -- they are registered at birth! Think of what we would avoid if we followed the Canadians -- all these disputes about legal registrations, purging of the registrations, complications at the polls and more.

Think about it -- What If every USA-born citizen simply was registered to vote at birth and entered into a national voters' registration? Those who become citizens via naturalization would receive their "voter number" when they take the oath. This wouldn't interfere with joining a political party, giving money to a party or candidate or all the other stuff that party politics bring.

Let's clean up voter registration and we can focus on the real problem -- voter fraud!

[torrrep]

You're free to move to Canada any time you like. Enjoy.

[Swerinjer2]

It's a strategy to deligitimize the Obama administration. Also its a prefab counterargument to neutralize the inevitable repug vote fraud.

[c1ee]

It is so sad and pathetic the depths of depravity these Republicans will go. It is equally sad and pathetic the lengths to which Democrats must prepare for such depths of depravity from these Republicans.

[knowBuddhaU]

Sister Bertha is right: there's gonna be a backlash if the Republicans lose, and it won't be pretty.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2008_11/015494.php

You might think, perhaps hope, that Republicans will engage in some soul-searching, that they'll ask themselves whether and how they lost touch with the national mainstream. But my prediction is that this won't happen any time soon.

Instead, the Republican rump, the party that's left after the election, will be the party that attends Sarah Palin's rallies, where crowds chant "Vote McCain, not Hussein!" It will be the party of Saxby Chambliss, the senator from Georgia, who, observing large-scale early voting by African-Americans, warns his supporters that "the other folks are voting." It will be the party that harbors menacing fantasies about Barack Obama's Marxist -- or was that Islamic? -- roots.

This seems very likely. For one thing, the few remaining Republican "moderates" (I use the word loosely) are leaving, thanks to a combination of primary defeats, general-election defeats, and retirements. What remains will be far-right lawmakers and further-right lawmakers.

For another, the party's base has already staked its claim -- conservatives firmly believe that Republicans lost in 2006 and have struggled in 2008 because the party just isn't reactionary enough....

The result, Krugman noted, is the acceleration of the Republican Party's "long transformation into the party of the unreasonable right, a haven for racists and reactionaries."

[Kassandra]

Well, then let's prosecute all these voter suppression tactics that are showing up. Like that guy in VA who sent out fliers telling Dems to vote on Wed. Not gonna prosecute HIM? What about the Repuke who is running as a Dem to confuse people?

If they want legal action, let's give it to them.....fight the McCain way:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/11/03/john-mccain-cant-stop-say_n_140618.html
You can't miss this one; priceless

[guajiro]

Agreed. And if they bring it up on live television, we need to challenge them by asking them if they are willing to stop all the supposed voter fraud by joining we liberals in passing an amendment that gives every citizen of the U.S. a FEDERAL RIGHT TO VOTE.

[GonzoFactor]

There should be a wave of slander lawsuits after the election, too. Particularly against some of the festering garbage that's been uttered this week, mostly by Republicans.

[TXfemmom]

The Republicans stole the election in 2000 and 2004 and they will attempt it again. They have nothing to loose, since they will lose once again. However, this time, the fight has to be fought that will keep them from twisting and stealing.

[charon]

If nothing else the ACORN suits will give bushco more time to destroy incriminating evidence.

[knowBuddhaU]

Right on, Sister! I happen to know Dave Neiwert. He's an investigative journalist from here in the Seattle area. It's been a long time since we talked. Now I wish I hadn't thrown out his business card when I moved. D'oh!

I've been studying the psychophysiology of empathical­ly-mediate­d altruism since the mid 80s. I wanted to understand how our brains are involved in stereotyping and racism. That led me into studying white supremacy, which in turn led me to Neiwert. He knew me when I was doing undercover militia group stuff. I can say from experience: Palin is indeed one of the whackos also known as dominionists.

http://www.harpers.org/archive/2008/10/hbc-90003772
By Scott Horton
"What [Max Blumenthal's] clips reveal is material to understanding Palin’s political and religious views... [T]he Wasilla congregation and Palin follow “dominionism,” a conviction that society must be governed exclusively by the law of God as set forth in the Bible....

Dominionists do not embrace the separation of church and state, and tend to approach political issues from a highly dogmatic stance, often focused on particular charismatic individuals they see as ordained to govern. Indeed, dominionists widely embraced George W. Bush as an “anointed” leader whose decisions were beyond debate."

Neiwert has his own blog, named for our local marine mammals, the orcas. It's called Orcinus. Give him a visit. http:dneiw­ert.blogsp­ot.com

[vegas9999]

Did you study any of this? http://www.nypost.com/seven/11032008/postopinion/opedcolumnists/stealing_an_election_136579.htm

[tck29]

Still no proof that ACORN promotes voter fraud. Some individuals have attempted registration fraud, and they were fired by ACORN, and in many cases turned over to the authorities by ACORN. Furthermore, fraudulent registrations MUST be submitted to the electoral boards so they were, WITH HUGE RED FLAGS ATTACHED TO THEM. Those registrations will not make it to the voter rolls, thereby avoiding voter fraud. Don't confuse registration fraud with voter fraud.

[Goddatunda]

And you actually think you're getting "information" from the NY Post?

ACORN false registrations are just that false registrations, not voters - have any of these Murdoch-Zombies ever considered what it would take for someone to actually vote with one of these things?

As for the donations, there is nothing illegal about taking anonymous donations up front, but the money has to be returned if the donor can't be identified. I expect the GOP will also make a big stink about this issue, but as long as Obama releases his records and returns any inidentified donor donations, they can't do squat.