Voter ID laws have emerged as a major dispute in the months before the 2012 election, pitting the Obama administration against a growing number of states seeking to ensure the integrity of their elections.
Two states, South Carolina and Texas, are already engaged in lawsuits with the Justice Department to halt their voter ID laws. Attorney General Eric Holder is probing Pennsylvania as well. Pennsylvania recently became the 11th state to enact a law since 2010.
All of these efforts seek to crack down on voter fraud by requiring a photo ID to vote. It’s as simple as that. Yet liberals have concocted a conspiracy that these laws disenfranchise minorities — an argument the Justice Department is now using in its lawsuits.
John Fund and Hans von Spakovsky debunk the liberal myths about voter fraud in a new book in stores next week, “Who‘s Counting? How Fraudsters and Bureaucrats Put Your Vote at Risk.” They’ll talk about it at today’s Bloggers Briefing, hosted by The Heritage Foundation, at noon ET. Breitbart TV will carry it live.
Fund, a columnist for National Review, previously wrote “Stealing Elections: How Voter Fraud Threatens Our Democracy.” He’s now teamed up with von Spakovsky, a former member of the Federal Election Commission who now works at The Heritage Foundation.
Their book includes specific examples of voter fraud, which liberals often claim doesn‘t exist.
“But voter fraud is a well-documented reality in American elections,” they write. “Just this year, a sheriff and county clerk in West Virginia pleaded guilty to stuffing ballot boxes with fraudulent absentee ballots that changed the outcome of an election. In 2005, a state senate election in Tennessee was overturned because of voter fraud. The margin of victory? 13 votes. In 2008, the Minnesota senate race that provided the 60th vote needed to pass Obamacare was decided by a little over 300 votes. Almost 200 felons have already been convicted of voting illegally in that election and dozens of other prosecutions are still pending.”
The issue is also resonating with voters. A poll conducted in April by Rasmussen found that 64% of likely voters think fraud at least a somewhat serious problem in America.
The Bloggers Briefing will also feature a sequestration update from Frank Gaffney, a member of the Coalition for a Common Defense. When lawmakers return from their August recess, they’ll have just four months to figure out a way to avoid the automatic, across–the–board spending cuts agreed to in last year’s debt-limit deal. Those cuts disproportionately target defense, prompting concerns from across the political spectrum.
Unless Congress acts, the U.S. military is facing $492 billion of mandatory defense cuts from sequestration agreed to in the Budget Control Act. An analysis of sequestration reveals that defense spending makes up nearly 43 percent of the cuts, a larger share than either entitlements or discretionary spending.
These cuts have real-life consequences. The Heritage Foundation recently in a three–part video series highlighted how previous military drawdowns impacted readiness and put American lives at risk.
The Bloggers Briefing was founded in May 2006 as a weekly policy discussion for conservative bloggers and journalists. Follow the action or ask a question on Twitter using the hashtag #BloggersBriefing.