FEMA (and politicians) won't help with New Orleans elections
We're just five days away from New Orleans' April 22 municipal elections, and the city's people have to endure another insult, the AP reports:
Secretary of State Al Ater wants to know why the federal government agreed to pay for New York City's municipal elections after Sept. 11, 2001, but refuses to pay for New Orleans' elections after Hurricane Katrina.This comes on top of the Department of Justice's announcement last month that there was no need for remote polling stations in states outside of Louisiana, even though 50-60% of New Orleans residents remain dispursed. (This is in contrast to the five remote balloting stations enjoyed by Iraqi expats in that country's 2005 vote.) As The Nation points out,
FEMA recently turned down Louisiana's request for the extra $3-4 million it will take to hold the April 22 New Orleans municipal elections, rescheduled in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.
But the agency shelled out $7.9 million after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks delayed New York City's elections.
Justice officials went so far as to claim that "minority members of the Louisiana House and Senate were unanimous" in supporting the plan, a claim roundly disputed by elected black leaders, including State Senator Cleo Fields.This is why thousands of New Orleans residents think that Republicans are out to disenfranchise them. But where have the Democrats done? As The Nation argues, not much:
Despite such overtly discriminatory actions, Democratic Party leaders have offered only listless support of voting rights efforts — Democratic National Committee chair Howard Dean called the Justice Department decision "a disappointing development." There have even been rumors that some Democrats in Washington welcome the dispersal of the African-American voters of New Orleans as a way of building up party strength elsewhere. Reverend Jackson, in recent remarks at the Nation office, said "Democrats are soft-shoeing" on the voting rights issue.Let’s be clear: we are facing one of the most egregious violations of the right to vote in over a generation. The right of the people of New Orleans – especially the displaced, largely African-American population – to vote is something EVERYBODY should be fighting for.
6 Comments:
That's not all Dean and the DNC did.
It is unconscionable that the DSCC and the DCCC haven't waded in to this fight.
The reasoning is clear. 911 was good for the administration and they capitalized by appearing to care about the victims. Katrina was bad for the administration... just forget it ever happened and move on, folks.
Isn't it illegal under the Voting Rights Act for policies to discriminate on the basis of race? If I remember right, there doesn't have to be any desire to discriminate. Resulting in discrimination is enough.
Disenfranchising those who are still displaced, disproportionately the poor and black, is going to have a huge race-based effect. Where's the ACLU--or anybody!--when you need them?
So lets get this straight... We had the ability to schedule elections across this country for Iraq's that had left their country 20 years ago. But we cannot help out with a local election for a community that was decimated by a Natural Disaster????? WTF
As a resident of New Orleans, I'm recording my opinion that we'd have received more help from the federal government if Democrats, not just our mayor and governor, had just STFU. I think you can consider it read that the President and the members of Congress aren't exactly going to open their hearts or the coffers to people who hate them as much as Democrats have come to hate them. So many Democrats speak and write as personal enemies of Bush, Cheney, the better-known Republican members of Congress, and Republicans generally. When we listen to you and read your words, some of us have the feeling that you very simply would like to see most of us dead. It's unreasonable for you to speak of us the way you do and yet expect us to be liberal to your constituencies.
Louisiana -- pay for it yourselves-- for once--
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