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| -Land of the Free |
| Texas AG Attack on Vote Fraud |
| 2014-08-31 |
| On an overcast Monday afternoon, officers in bulletproof vests swept into a house on Houston's north side. The armed deputies and agents served a search warrant. They carted away computers, hard drives and documents. This was in 2010, it says several paragraphs down. The timing of this article, however, has nothing to do with the upcoming election race pitting Wendy Davis against current AG Greg Abbott. Nothing at all. The raid targeted a voter registration group called Houston Votes, which was accused of election fraud. It was initiated by investigators for Attorney General Greg Abbott. His aides say he is duty-bound to preserve the integrity of the ballot box. Can't he just ignore the laws the Democrats don't like? His critics, however, say that what Abbott has really sought to preserve is the power of the Republican Party in Texas. They accuse him of political partisanship, targeting key Democratic voting blocs, especially minorities and the poor, in ways that make it harder for them to vote, or for their votes to count. If the Dems are going to take over, they should at least do it lawfully. A close examination of the Houston Votes case reveals the consequences when an elected official pursues hotly contested allegations of election fraud. Consider that a warning of the slant of the rest of the article. The investigation was closed one year after the raid, with no charges filed. But for Houston Votes, the damage was done. Its funding dried up, and its efforts to register more low-income voters ended. Its records and office equipment never were returned. Instead, under a 2013 court order obtained by Abbott�'s office, they were destroyed. That's interesting. Maybe that's what set the precedent for Lois Lerner? A Rice University study of census data found that between 2000 and 2010, the Houston metropolitan area added 1.2 million people �-- more than any other urban region in the U.S. Some of them were probably Katrina relocatees, living off the Texas dole instead of the Louisiana dole. Nearly 70 percent of Harris County�'s residents are Hispanic, black or Asian. Those racial groups are driving population growth, said Richard Murray, a political science professor at the University of Houston. The number of whites has declined to 33 percent, according to census data. Studies have reached different conclusions about the effect of Voter ID laws on turnout across the nation. Depending, it would seem, on which position they wanted to support. The strictest measures lowered turnout among less educated and lower-income citizens �-- for both minorities and whites, according to a 2008 study led by a California Institute of Technology professor. But earlier this year, Judicial Watch, a conservative group, released a study showing that turnout increased after North Carolina�'s Voter ID law took effect, especially among black voters. Voter registration drives that use paid workers have fallen prey to fraudulent applications being submitted intentionally, according to a report by the Brennan Center for Justice. Whoa! Good thing there are no O'care workers paid to enroll folks. Right? "These forms actually defraud the voter registration drives, which compensate workers on the expectation that their time will be spent registering new and eligible citizens; the worker herself is interested not in defrauding the government, but in getting credit for work she didn't do," the study said. Which - coincidentally! - defrauds the Government. In late 2013, Abbott's office asked judges in Harris and Travis counties for permission to destroy the records seized in the two raids. The request said records contained the names of people who were not suspects, partial Social Security numbers and forged voter registration applications. So the judges said "O.K." and the records were destroyed. Not quite so partisan/ominous at the end of the article as it seemed at the beginning. |
| Posted by:Bobby |
| #4 The investigation was closed one year after the raid, with no charges filed. But for Houston Votes, the damage was done. Its funding dried up, and its efforts to register more low-income voters ended. Ah, gee. Isn't that the same tactic the IRS used against the Tea Party organizations? That is using the power of a government agency to suppress voter organizations? Pot, Kettle. What screams louder than a pig caught in the fence? Two pigs. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2014-08-31 18:43 |
| #3 "If the Dems are going to take over, they should at least do it lawfully." Why? They never have before. |
| Posted by: Barbara 2014-08-31 18:21 |
| #2 Hurricane Katrina hitting New Orleans increased Houston's population substantially. |
| Posted by: Ebbomosh Hupemp2664 2014-08-31 18:02 |
| #1 between 2000 and 2010, the Houston metropolitan area added 1.2 million people — more than any other urban region in the U.S. Nearly 70 percent of Harris County’s residents are Hispanic, black or Asian. Though there is a lot of overlap, Harris County is not exactly the same as the Houston Metropolitan Area - I get suspicious of reporters who compare apples with oranges, while pretending they are not; just what are they hiding/misrepresenting? As Bobby points out, the role of Katrina evacuees was significant - were they in Harris or GHMA? (Harris, methinks.) Oil industry boom has moved a lot of actual working people in (almost impossible to find a 'normal' single-family house on the market these days) - were they in Harris, or GHMA (GHMA, methinks.) |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2014-08-31 15:37 |