-
-
Rep. Dan Lungren (R-CA) called on the Department of Justice to do their jobs and ensure that military voters have the ability to participate in next week's election. In a letter to the Department of Justice (linked in the press release below) he raised questions as to why the MOVE Act was not properly enforced in a number of states who were in violation of the law which is supposed to protect military voters and their right to vote.
The press release is below.
Lungren to DOJ: Do Your Job!
Ranking Republican on House Elections Committee Criticizes Department of Justice For Failure to Enforce Federal Election Laws; Says Continued Military Disenfranchisement is Unacceptable
WASHINGTON – Today the Committee on House Administration's Ranking Republican Dan Lungren, R-Calif., criticized the Department of Justice for its failure to enforce federal election laws, specifically questioning the Department's inability to ensure that states comply with the MOVE Act by mailing military ballots prior to the 45 day statutory deadline.
In a letter sent to Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez, Rep. Lungren rebuked the DOJ's efforts in New Mexico and Illinois, where the DOJ waited until a month past the deadline to file lawsuits against the states for failing to mail ballots to military personnel serving overseas. "In both cases it appears that DOJ learned of the noncompliance not through its own efforts, but as a result of private parties contacting election jurisdictions and sharing the results of their inquiries," Lungren noted. "If the Voting Section has 20 staff members engaged in a nationwide compliance program, I would expect that they would detect noncompliance promptly without relying on private organizations."
Lungren also sharply criticized the Department for failing to enforce compliance in New York after the Department of Defense granted the state an extension to comply. He said that these systemic failures suggest that, "the Department seems to be more focused on protecting its image than on building an effective mechanism to produce compliance."
In response to the Department's failures, Lungren called for a more active role by the House of Representatives in enforcing voting laws. "It is my intent that the Committee on House Administration, as the committee of jurisdiction over Federal elections, will take a more active role in the next Congress in ensuring that the laws enacted by Congress to protect the ability of Americans to vote are followed."
-
-
RNLA Executive Director Michael Thielen had an Op Ed published on The Hill's Congress Blog detailing just how Democrats are still disenfranchising voters, fail to recognize that vote fraud does exist, and how elected Democrats have stacked the deck to help vote fraud to continue. You can check out the op ed here or see key highlights below.
Former American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) voting rights project attorney Christopher Coates recently left his job as the Civil Rights Division's Voting Section chief at the Department of Justice because he believed in the principle of race neutrality. And race was not the only area where DOJ would not enforce the law as it was written.
Part of the Help American Vote Act (HAVA) sponsored by retiring Democratic Senator Chris Dodd, involved provisions making certain types of vote fraud more difficult to execute. For instance, problems that had allowed the dead to vote or for people to vote twice were addressed by removing them from the voter rolls. But, in the Obama Department of Justice, Coates and others were told that they were no longer enforcing those parts of the law.
[…]
But worst of all is the continued, systematic disenfranchisement of those serving in our military. Just like in the early days of the Civil Rights Movement, a few good Democrats in the Northeast are crying foul and trying to stop the disenfranchisement. In the extremely close 2000 presidential election, the Gore campaign and its lawyers attempted to steal the presidential contest by disenfranchising Florida military voters with hyper technicalities. The situation only stopped when then-Democratic Vice Presidential nominee Joe Lieberman agreed it was wrong.
In 2010, Senator Charles Schumer of New York co-sponsored the MOVE Act, which gave overseas military voters a better chance to have their votes counted. But here again, the Obama DOJ knowing that the majority of these ballots were to be cast for Republicans, did very little to guarantee the right of those in uniform to vote, outside largely symbolic actions taken in places like Guam.
Yet only when Schumer and others complained, did the Department of Justice respond by finally reacting in key states such as Illinois but as a result of all these DOJ efforts, military voters in Illinois have a few extra days to send in their ballots despite the fact election officials sent ballots weeks late to our men and women in uniform fighting abroad to defend our democracy.
Liberals will have you believe that disenfranchisement, intimidation, and other forms of vote fraud do not exist and make no difference in election results. But in the last two elections, the balance of power has been altered significantly due to vote fraud.
For instance, after the narrow election of John Tester in Montana provided Democrats with control of the United States Senate in 2006, Governor Brian Schweitzer of Montana bragged how he got Tester elected.
[…]
The ultimate irony is that while some Democrats continue to disenfranchise our military, enforce our laws on the basis of race, condone the intimidation of elections officials and take away the right of people to have their votes counted, they continue to blast Republicans with groundless and hollow allegations of intimidation and disenfranchisement. This strategy was first discovered as part of their 2004 Colorado victory guide where Democrats were told to manufacture allegations of intimidation, even if none existed to generate publicity. That is exactly what's happening this year
-
-
One of RNLA's founding members, Betty Southard-Murphy passed away this past weekend. In honor of Betty's memory, take a look at a profile that was written in 1996 on Betty's career. The piece looks at her days as a reporter with UPI to work with the National Labor Relations Board and the administrator of the Federal Wage and Hour Division and finally to private practice. It is a good read and shows just how Betty was a "Legend of the Law".
Here is a small sampling of a must read profile of a great attorney and great friend of the RNLA.
A specialist in U.S. and international employment law, Betty Southard Murphy is the only person to have served as both chairman of the National Labor Relations Board and administrator of the Wage and Hour Division of the U.S. Department of Labor. Her five additional Presidential appointments include the Commission on the Bicentennial of the U.S. Constitution on which she chaired the International Advisory Committee and the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes. A partner in Baker & Hostetler since 1980, Murphy has tried cases in 25 states, and has appeared in nine U.S. Courts of Appeals, and the Supreme Court.
-
-
This week, the Republican National Lawyers Association (RNLA) raised concerns about the Obama Administration's failure to enforce the MOVE Act, resulting in several states missing deadlines to mail ballots to troops serving overseas this fall. The media -- including Politico and FOX News -- reported our valid concerns, and the Administration quickly responded, filing suit against the state of New York and promising to investigate the state of Illinois.
But liberal-opinion media also noticed, and is now working to discredit the RNLA with false and libelous allegations. For example, a headline on the liberal Web site Talking Points Memo today said that the RNLA "gins up voter fraud". And a post earlier this week falsely reported, "Republicans have a habit of ginning up fears of voter fraud just before national elections."
As Politico reported, "The RNLA is a group of Republican lawyers who advise candidates on election laws and provide assistance on recounts and charges of voter fraud." Our goal is to ensure the integrity of elections -- to make sure that every qualified person has a right to vote and that every legal vote is counted. As the election nears, it's likely that we'll see more cases of voter fraud -- and more efforts to smear the RNLA in the liberal media. But so long as voter fraud is a live issue, we'll stay strong.
-
-
This morning, the RNLA issued a press release calling on the Obama Administration to do more to protect military voters who are being disenfranchised by a number of states (including New York) who have failed to send ballots to military voters serving overseas. Politico's Mike Allen highlighted the press release this morning in a blog post.
A group of Republican lawyers and law students on Tuesday called for the Obama administration to do more to ensure that members of the military are able to cast ballots in the Nov. 2 elections.
David Norcross, chairman of the Republican National Lawyers Association, said in a statement: "The MOVE Act was passed last year to ensure that these brave men and women would have a voice in this fall's elections. It's unacceptable that any state would fail to meet that obligation. The Obama Administration must act swiftly to guarantee that ever service member receives his or her ballot in time to vote."
Allen also noted a curious lawsuit filed against Guam for failing to comply with the MOVE Act, versus some of the various states in the Union that have failed to meet the requirements of the Act.
But Norcross said in his statement: "Filing a suit in Guam is not a serious attempt to ensure that every state following the law and ensuring military votes. … The Justice Department should be filing similar suits in New York and any other state that is failing to meet the MOVE Act."