Voter registration fraud

Charges levied against ACORN are “overwrought?” (10/17 editorial, “Overstating the point”) Fraudulent registration is the first step toward fraudulent voting.

Using The Star editorial board’s bizarre logic, we shouldn’t worry about sneaking guns onto airplanes because it’s not a really a hijacking until the trigger is pulled.

Justin Stanley
Kansas City

Comments

[Engineer]

solomon
"You have ACORN getting funding on the volume of names they turn in as registered".
Based on this, you are saying that ACORN is knowingly committing fraud or sponsoring fraudulent registration in order to get funding.

[Jim]

Marctnts,

I think ACORN's practices are clearly fraught with problems and their problems with their canvassers are self-inflicted. They clearly need to dramatically improve their standards when it comes to the people they hire.

But those problems are on the front-end. They're being accused right now of being outright corrupt on the back-end. We're supposed to believe that they are capable of throwing a national election, which is ludicrous. McCain even said they had the potential to "destroy the fabric of democracy" in the last debate. This unfounded hysteria is pure politics, plain and simple.

After 2000, all we heard for a while from whiny Democrats was how illegitimate Bush was because the vote was rigged. Then we heard more of it in 2004. Neither time were there any facts to back that up, just conspiracy theories based on cherry-picked factoids.

This year, it's becoming obvious that the conspiratorial shoe will be on the other foot.

[Marctnts]

Jim,

I agree that ACORN is innocent until proven guilty.

If you will re-read my post, my issue with ACORN is that their system encourages (whether passively or actively) the type of fraud that their canvassers have been accused of. When you hire convicted felons (I know, they deserve a break, but probably not this type of one) and institute quotas, it would be reasonable to anticipate these types of bogus registrations occurring.

Additionally, ACORN is to be admired for putting "questionable" registrations in a separate pile. This does not, however, alleviate them of the responsibility for overburdening the system with thousands of verifications because of their practices.

[Jim]

Incredulous,

The Help America Vote Act is a federal law, and requires newly registered voters to present a valid ID at the polling place before they're ever allowed near a ballot. This would seem to call into question conservatives' contentions that Mickey Mouse and Heda Lettuce are actually getting in to vote. There's been no evidence that that's happening, despite the claims to the contrary.

ACORN makes it a practice to separate registration cards into three piles: verifiable forms, incomplete forms and questionable forms. I've seen TV reports recently that included statements from election officials that that was the case.

There's been no evidence presented that ACORN has done anything untoward or underhanded in doing what it's required by law to do. Again, the people who fill out the bogus registration cards are the ones committing the fraud, and they're perpetrating it on ACORN itself.

Simply being under investigation by a politicized Justice Department doesn't make them guilty of anything.

[Incredulous]

Jim,
The only ID required in Missouri is the ID that is actually created in the registration process.

Interesting that ACORN claims to cull the bad registrations yet none of the news reports site an election official crediting ACORN with this behavior.

[Jim]

The GOP know that they're going to lose this year on some, if not many, levels. So, instead of taking a look at their own message and platform and failures while in power, they whip up this ACORN crap to de-legitimize any Democratic win.

Never mind that they can't point to any systemic voter fraud problem as a result of ACORN's actions (they tried and failed miserably in New Mexico yesterday).

This all becomes clear as the red herring it is when you consider the fact that from 2002-2005 only 20 people in the entire country were found to have voted while not eligible to, and only five were found to have voted more than once.

It's true that a tiny percentage (1-3%) of ACORN's hired registration workers turned in stacks of cards with fraudulent registrations, essentially committing fraud against ACORN (they were subsequently fired). And it's true that those cards were submitted to election boards along with the legitimate ones. But here's what they don't tell you:

- ACORN is required by law to submit any and all voter registration cards they receive, regardless of whether or not they are deemed legitimate at the time. Trashing those cards would be against the law.

- ACORN routinely goes through and pulls the cards that appear fraudulent or questionable, and submits them in separate piles, alerting the election authorities to their questionable nature.

- The Help America Vote Act of 2002 requires someone who is newly registered to present an ID the first time they vote. It's astounding that people ginning this up actually seem to think that Mickey Mouse will show up to vote simply because some idiot put his name on a card. But even if he did, he'd have to show an ID to actually vote.

If you want to see a real voter scandal, take a look at what's going on all over the country:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/09/us/politics/09voting.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

[Incredulous]

Dismissing fraudulent registrations is foolish.

Mickey Mouse aside, We should all worry about registrants using friend's addresses to receive voter ID cards under assumed names. It is too simple to register in multiple districts. Ms. Carnahan's website says you don't need anything but the (non-photo)voter id card to vote. Yes, fraudulent registrations can easily affect this election.

http://www.sos.mo.gov/elections/voterid/default.asp

[Marctnts]

It seems that the two real concerns with ACORN's actions are:

1. The incredibly stupid practices they employ with canvassers, which if not actively encouraging fraud are at least passively encouraging it, are supported to a large extent by the American taxpayers. A good portion of ACORN's support comes from grants and credits from the government.

2. The quantity of fraudulent registrations turned in may bog down the system and allow "real" threats through. If I'm sorting through a few thousand registrations to find duplicates with different address, the obvious "Mickey's" and the like, I am forced to expend resources better spent looking for the less obvious but no more qualified registrations.

Face it, no one named Mickey Mouse is going to cast a vote, and almost all of the duplicate registers will vote only once, if at all. There will, however, be some who will exploit the situation to vote multiple times in multiple districts and polling places.

[solomon]

I will agree that I made a poor statement here. Voter fraud has existed since we got off the boat from Europe and started casting votes. There is documentation that shows the irish could be bought with a drink and that other immigrants were purchased with promises of employment. it is not unique to ACORN or any other group.

I still contend mickey Mouse will never get by the poll judge.

[Rogue]

It is naive at best to claim that not one single fraudjulent registration has ever voted, or voted multiple times. The later case was just discovered in Ohio.

I would also point out to Simple, that a photo ID is not required to vote. A federal judge recently struck down the idea. All one need do is show up and get a ballot.

To claim "innocence for ACORN, now under investigation in fifteen states is absurd.

[solomon]

Engineer,

You have canvassers filling out fake names to turn in so they can get paid. You have ACORN getting funding on the volume of names they turn in as registered. Looks like a flaw in a system that pays the scam artist canvassers and funds ACORN.

Has no outcome whatsoever on who actually gets into the booth. Makes a great sound byte for people screaming that the sky is falling.

[Simple_Jack]

so. ;et's say that mickey mouse is registered by ACORN. And mickey mouse goes to vote. Mickey needs an id.... so is he going to get that from the DMV? do you think the person checking them in would actually believe someone named mickey mouse is really supposed to be on there and would let them vote? Even if they dressed in a giant mouse costime?

mickey mouse may be registered to vote, and probably in more than one area. He will probably receive some votes too. But no matter how many times he is registered, this is how many times he will actually cast a vote: 0

[Engineer]

solomon
It's happened time after time so ACORN must know it's going to happen. But they keep on doing the sane thing. There must be some reason they keep acting in this manner.

[solomon]

Voter fraud is a crime and should not be tolerated. That being said I always show my ID when I vote, even though the ladies there have known me for years. Where is the issue here? Are there mob guys buying shots or rocks for people voting more than once? I doubt it. Are there people turning in names of people who won't vote as Mickey Mouse, Dick Trickle or Heywood Jablome? Yes, but these guys defrauding ACORN for a paycheck can't affect out upcoming election one bit.