NPR: Did GOP Use 'Caging' to Block Some Voters in 2004?

Did GOP Use 'Caging' to Block Some Voters in 2004?

Ever since the 2004 election, rumors have floated occasionally in the media -- and frequently in the blogosphere -- that there was some kind of monkey business in Ohio that helped tip the vote for President Bush.

On Friday, PBS' NOW explored allegations that the Republican Party used a tactic called "voter caging" in Ohio, Florida and other key election states to prevent typically Democratic-leaning groups like minorities and students from voting. And NOW investigated reports that a similar plan may be in place for the 2008 election. (You can watch the entire program on the show's Web site.)

In a political context, "voter caging" involves using direct mail to challenge people's voter registration. Few had heard of it before Monica Goodling mentioned it in her testimony before the House Judiciary Committee.

NOW talked to journalist Greg Palast, who first reported on "voter caging" for the BBC in 2004, when a Bush parody site claimed to have accidentally received confidential e-mails about it.

Palast also explained his charges in a recent post on the liberal BradBlog: "The Bush-Cheney operatives sent hundreds of thousands of letters marked 'Do not forward' to voters' homes. Letters returned ('caged') were used as evidence to block these voters' right to cast a ballot on grounds they were registered at phony addresses. Who were the evil fakers? Homeless men, students on vacation and --- you got to love this --- American soldiers. Oh yeah: most of them are Black voters."

NOW reports that the voter caging issue might be tied into the Justice Department's firing of eight U.S. attorneys. NOW interviewed one of the fired prosecutors, David Iglesias, who says he was pressured by key Republicans to engage in "unlawful activities," including what would have amounted to voter suppression. He believes that the White House is withholding documents to protect people like Karl Rove, Harriet Miers and Sara Taylor because there is "incriminating, possibly criminally incriminating evidence contained in those e-mails and other memoranda."

I suspect that voter caging is something we'll hear more about in the next few weeks.

3:08 PM ET | 07-30-2007 | permalink

Comments (Send a comment)

What I found so disgusting was that, according the NOW piece, caging isn't, in and of itself, illegal.

What I found even more disgusting is that this isn't being done by some fringe, non-GOP-sponsored group. It's actually being planned, executed and encouraged by the RNC itself.

It'd be nice, however, if the "liberal media" would share all this with the American public. But I guess Lindsay Lohan gets better ratings ...

**sigh**

Sent by Mark | 4:23 PM ET | 07-30-2007

I was a freshman in college during the 2004 presidential election, and I decided to vote absentee in my home state of Ohio. A few days before my ballot was due and well after it should have been sent to me, I received a call from the Hamilton County (OH) Board of Elections with a message that my mailing address in North Carolina (where I had already received mail from relatives and plenty of advertisers) was "not valid." I therefore would not be receiving an absentee ballot. I confirmed that the address I had provided the BOE was the same that had been assigned to me by my university. There was no discrepancy, but still no ballot. The BOE never provided a more detailed reason for not mailing me a ballot.

At the time, I was a registered as a Democrat in the state of Ohio.

Sent by Mike | 4:24 PM ET | 07-30-2007

Next up, electronic voting! And the GOP will make sure paper receipts will NOT be provided upon request. Electronic data can be hacked into something quite 'elastic' you know. One way or another, Rove's gonna get his permanent Republican majority. Got Democracy?

Sent by John R. Otten | 6:39 PM ET | 07-30-2007

I want to hear Greg Palast on NPR.

Sent by Mark Filipak | 9:48 AM ET | 12-11-2007

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