by Pamela Powers Hannley Tucson has a reputation of being Arizona's hotbed of liberal thought, old hippie ideas, great music, and electic art, but how progressive is Tucson? Pretty darn progressive… – Recently 341 Pima County residents were elected as precinct committee people (PCs). These volunteers represent the Democratic Party's ground game. They show up to … Read more
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
Both The Arizona Republic and the Arizona Daily Star subscribe to the syndicated Washington Post op-eds. Somehow I don't think they will be republishing today's editorial opinion from the Washington Post. Arizona’s bad immigration law takes effect:
AFTER A TWO-YEAR struggle, a federal judge this week authorized Arizona law enforcement agencies to require officers to check the immigration status of anyone they suspect is in the country illegally. Wearing the wrong clothes, speaking with the wrong accent or having the wrong skin color could land you in hot water in Arizona.
The state’s “show me your papers” provision — one of the most bitterly contested parts of the obnoxious immigration law enacted in 2010 — is the second such measure to receive a green light from federal courts. The first was from Alabama, where a similar policy was implemented about a year ago.
There, according to a recent report by the National Immigration Law Center, an immigrant advocacy group, law enforcement officers have created an “environment of racial profiling” that has encouraged private citizens to discriminate and abuse people they regard as foreign. The report, based on thousands of calls to a hotline, recounted instances of Hispanics, including legal residents, who were repeatedly stopped by police on flimsy pretexts and, in some cases, subjected to prolonged roadside detentions.
Arizona has a far larger population of Hispanics than Alabama does, including citizens, legal residents and illegal immigrants. Many of them have good reason to brace for similar treatment. Although the Supreme Court upheld Arizona’s “show me your papers” provision, the justices warned that it could be struck down if it gave rise to a documented pattern of racial profiling or if it caused detentions to be prolonged. The Alabama case suggests that is highly likely.
Posted by AzBlueMeanie: In a simple three-paragraph ruling drafted jointly by the U.S. Department of Justice and lawyers for the state of Arizona, U.S. District Court Judge Susan Bolton ordered that the injunction be dissolved against the "show me your papers clause" of SB 1070. That provision, Section 2B, requires officers to make a reasonable … Read more
Posted by AzBlueMeanie: As the Bard would say, "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark Pennsylvania." The Pennsylvania Supreme Court today, rather than ruling on that state's voter ID law as the state's highest court, instead remanded the case back to the Republican trial court judge who ignored the evidence at trial and ordered … Read more
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
The New York Times finally caught up to the Tea Party voter suppression efforts by "True the Vote" in a lengthy report on Sunday. Looking, Very Closely, for Voter Fraud:
It might as well be Harry Potter’s invisible Knight Bus, because no one can prove it exists.
The bus has been repeatedly cited by True the Vote, a national group
focused on voter fraud. Catherine Engelbrecht, the group’s leader, told a
gathering in July about buses carrying dozens of voters showing up at
polling places during the recent Wisconsin recall election.
“Magically, all of them needed to register and vote at the same time,”
Ms. Engelbrecht said. “Do you think maybe they registered falsely under
false pretenses? Probably so.”
Weeks later, another True the Vote representative told a meeting of
conservative women about a bus seen at a San Diego polling place in 2010
offloading people “who did not appear to be from this country.”
Officials in both San Diego and Wisconsin said they had no evidence that
the buses were real. “It’s so stealthy that no one is ever able to get a
picture and no one is able to get a license plate,” said Reid Magney, a
spokesman for the Wisconsin agency that oversees elections. In some
versions the bus is from an Indian reservation; in others it is full of
voters from Chicago or Detroit. “Pick your minority group,” he said.
[In 2010, Tea Party candidate Jesse Kelly's Claims That Mexicans Are Being Bused In To Vote Were Dismissed By AZ Secretary Of State – the claims “are without merit.” Matthew Benson, then communications director for the Arizona Secretary of State’s Office, called it an “urban legend” and pointed out that “in terms of specific instances, we haven’t seen it.”]
The buses are part of the election fraud gospel according to True the
Vote, which is mobilizing a small army of volunteers to combat what it
sees as a force out to subvert elections. Ms. Engelbrecht’s July speech
in Montana was titled “Voter Fraud: The Plot to Undermine American
Democracy.”
True the Vote’s plan is to scrutinize the validity of voter registration
rolls and voters who appear at the polls. Among those in their cross
hairs: noncitizens who are registered to vote, those without proper
identification, others who may be registered twice, and dead people. In
Ohio and Indiana, True the Vote recently filed lawsuits to force
officials to clean up voter rolls.
* * *
In a report this month, the liberal-leaning organizations Common Cause
and Demos cited True the Vote as the central player in this effort,
which it called a threat to the fundamental right to vote.
* * *
While [Ms. Englebrecht] portrays True the Vote as nonpartisan, it grew out of a Tea Party
group, King Street Patriots, that she founded in Texas. An examination
shows that it has worked closely with a variety of well-financed
organizations, many unabashed in their desire to defeat President Obama.
A polished and provocative video, circulating among Tea Party activists,
seeks to raise a “cavalry” to march on swing states and identifies True
the Vote as a participant in the effort, called Code Red USA.
In the past year, Americans for Prosperity, an organization founded by
the billionaire Koch brothers, and other Republican-leaning independent
groups have sponsored meetings featuring Ms. Engelbrecht and other True
the Vote speakers.