The great NC voting scandal that wasn't
The great North Carolina crusade against "voter fraud" ended today with a sputter.
Facing South just returned from the N.C. Senate committee hearing where N.C. State Auditor Leslie Merritt (R) got a chance to make his case about voting "irregularities" in the state. FS readers will remember that Merritt's office raised their concerns literally minutes before the Senate committee was prepared to vote on a bill allowing same-day registration at early voting sites.
So what damning information did Merritt have? Still no official report -- as before, just "preliminary findings" from a "confidential" investigation that his office has yet to disclose. Many were surprised to hear that the auditor's office had found new information beyond what they had released before -- claims that the State Board of Elections argue they already answered in a 10-page letter.
"We still have questions," Merritt insisted at the hearing.
The most interesting moment in the hearings came when a Senator confronted Merritt with an internal e-mail between Chris Mears -- the state auditor's public affairs officer and former political director of the N.C. Republican Party -- and a private citizen, in which Mears admitted his office raised fears of voter fraud specifically in response to the same-day registration bill (the auditor's office had previously denied the charge). Merritt contradicted his subordinate, saying the voter fraud issue was all his idea.
At today's hearing, the N.C. auditor's office also insisted there has been "no coordination" between them and the federal Department of Justice. Legally, of course, saying the auditor's office hasn't "coordinated" with DOJ is quite different from saying there's been no contact at all, which remains to be seen.
The timeline of events definitely makes the connection between the same-day registration bill (HB 91), the State Auditor's "review," and the DOJ's interest in N.C. seem like more than a coincidence.
For example, the State Auditor released another "preliminary report" (pdf) on supposed problems with Social Security numbers of registered voters on March 20 -- two days before HB 91 was to come up in the House Election Law committee (it passed).
Another example: the State Auditor and DOJ seem to have both become especially concerned about voting in North Carolina after the N.C. House passed HB 91 on March 29. On April 18, the DOJ sent the N.C. Board of Elections a letter (pdf) inquiring about voter list maintenance. Two days later, the State Auditor also requested a meeting with the election board on the same topic.
What are the chances? The full story of what really happened remains to be told.
As for the meeting itself, it ended with State Auditor Merritt admitting to the state Senate committee that he "didn't have anything that should stop you passing the [same-day registration] bill." The committee promptly voted to send the bill to the full Senate -- but not without the Auditor's office being gently chastised.
Committee co-chair Sen. Clodfelter (D) ended with this admonition: "I would hope in the future that when a public agency decides to intervene to stop the legislative process, that they would be able to explain why they are making that intervention."
Facing South just returned from the N.C. Senate committee hearing where N.C. State Auditor Leslie Merritt (R) got a chance to make his case about voting "irregularities" in the state. FS readers will remember that Merritt's office raised their concerns literally minutes before the Senate committee was prepared to vote on a bill allowing same-day registration at early voting sites.
So what damning information did Merritt have? Still no official report -- as before, just "preliminary findings" from a "confidential" investigation that his office has yet to disclose. Many were surprised to hear that the auditor's office had found new information beyond what they had released before -- claims that the State Board of Elections argue they already answered in a 10-page letter.
"We still have questions," Merritt insisted at the hearing.
The most interesting moment in the hearings came when a Senator confronted Merritt with an internal e-mail between Chris Mears -- the state auditor's public affairs officer and former political director of the N.C. Republican Party -- and a private citizen, in which Mears admitted his office raised fears of voter fraud specifically in response to the same-day registration bill (the auditor's office had previously denied the charge). Merritt contradicted his subordinate, saying the voter fraud issue was all his idea.
At today's hearing, the N.C. auditor's office also insisted there has been "no coordination" between them and the federal Department of Justice. Legally, of course, saying the auditor's office hasn't "coordinated" with DOJ is quite different from saying there's been no contact at all, which remains to be seen.
The timeline of events definitely makes the connection between the same-day registration bill (HB 91), the State Auditor's "review," and the DOJ's interest in N.C. seem like more than a coincidence.
For example, the State Auditor released another "preliminary report" (pdf) on supposed problems with Social Security numbers of registered voters on March 20 -- two days before HB 91 was to come up in the House Election Law committee (it passed).
Another example: the State Auditor and DOJ seem to have both become especially concerned about voting in North Carolina after the N.C. House passed HB 91 on March 29. On April 18, the DOJ sent the N.C. Board of Elections a letter (pdf) inquiring about voter list maintenance. Two days later, the State Auditor also requested a meeting with the election board on the same topic.
What are the chances? The full story of what really happened remains to be told.
As for the meeting itself, it ended with State Auditor Merritt admitting to the state Senate committee that he "didn't have anything that should stop you passing the [same-day registration] bill." The committee promptly voted to send the bill to the full Senate -- but not without the Auditor's office being gently chastised.
Committee co-chair Sen. Clodfelter (D) ended with this admonition: "I would hope in the future that when a public agency decides to intervene to stop the legislative process, that they would be able to explain why they are making that intervention."
Labels: department of justice, north carolina, voting rights
3 Comments:
So when a DA makes erroneous allegations he gets disbarred (hello, Mike Nifong). What happens when a state official does that same things, wasting taxpayers money for his own partisan agenda?
The DOJ memo to the North Carolina State Board of Elections reads just like a form letter. That concerns me - how many other states got a similar letter, a letter that actually reads as if it were a "license" to purge voters?
We need to tip off our US Representatives that NC is under the gun.
Our state has one of the least political elections administration in the country, and its amazing that the DOJ and anyone else have the gaul to try to politicize that.
www.ncvoter.net
It may be worse than wasting time and money, bad as that is. Does anybody have an idea as to the recipient of the private letter? How it came into the possession of the Senator? Who the Senator is? What exactly it said?
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