Do you believe voter fraud is a serious issue in the United States today?
I assure you Jerry Brown – the California Attorney General – does not.
Do the videos of ACORN exposed by BigGovernment.com concern you? How about facts like these:
In Washington state’s disputed 2004 governor’s race, which was won by 129 votes, the election superintendent in Seattle testified in state court that ineligible felons had voted and votes had been cast in the name of the dead. In Milwaukee, Wis., investigators found that, in the state’s close 2004 presidential election, more than 200 felons voted illegally and more than 100 people voted twice. In Florida, where the entire 2000 presidential election was decided by 547 votes, almost 65,000 dead people are still listed on the voter rolls–an engraved invitation to fraud. A New York Daily News investigation in 2006 found that between 400 and 1,000 voters registered in Florida and New York City had voted twice in at least one recent election.
Does voter fraud like that concern you?
It doesn’t concern Jerry Brown. How do I know? It’s really quite simple.
Senator George Runner of California submitted a simple and straight forward Voter ID initiative which, in part, requires that California citizens show a government ID before they vote. Senator Runner fashioned his initiative on voter identification requirements upheld by the US Supreme Court. In other words, Runner’s initiative is consistent with the law of the land.
Also, keep in mind, as John Fund of the Wall Street Journal points out – time and again- “members of a bipartisan federal commission headed by former President Jimmy Carter and former Secretary of State James Baker came out in support of photo ID requirements . . . [in part because] . . . Voters in nearly 100 democracies use a photo identification card without fear of infringement on their rights.”
When faced with a similar Voter ID Initiative, in 2005, then California Attorney General Lockyer provided the following title and summary for the initiative:
“VOTER IDENTIFICATION REQUIREMENT. INITIATIVE STATUTE. Requires that voters present one of four types of picture ID before voting.”
Why did Lockyer do that? Because Attorney Generals are required by California law to clearly and truthfully state the “chief, purposes, and points” of such initiatives.
But all of that doesn’t matter at all to Jerry Brown. For his part, Brown summarized the Runner Vote ID initiative as:
LIMITS ON VOTING. INITIATIVE STATUTE. Prohibits citizens from voting at the polls, unless they present a government-issued photo identification card. Establishes provisional voting for citizens at the polls who fail to present government issued photo-identification card.
Why did Brown do it that way? According to Brown’s office:
“Sen. Runner fails to acknowledge the troubled history of voting in our country where some have erected discriminatory barriers including poll taxes, literary tests and requirements that one own property in order to vote. Sen. Runner justifies his new restrictions based on claims of widespread fraud, but empirical evidence is to the contrary; such cases are extraordinarily rare…These restrictions are all new, and they derive from Sen. Runner and his partisan allies…”
And you thought ACORN was the problem?
Well, Jerry Brown is part of the problem as well – which is why Senator Runner filed a lawsuit, on October 14, 2009, against Brown for his “unfair, partial, argumentative, confusing, and misleading” Ballot Title and Summary.
Oh, and perhaps the best/scariest part? Jerry Brown wants to be Governor of California again. I am sure that ACORN cannot wait for that possibility.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.