Voter purge in key Indiana County goes overboard
Source: Washington Post
La Porte County Democratic Party Chairman John Jones began to suspect there was problem late last week when he started getting calls from early voters who said they’d been turned away by election officials as ineligible.
The county set out in 2011 to clean up its rolls, purging those who had failed to vote in the previous two federal election cycles. The exercise was expected to involve around 800 names, many of them people who were dead, incarcerated or had left the northwest Indiana county about 60 miles east of Chicago.
But Jones was hearing from residents who were quite alive and had voted in 2008. When state officials looked at the list of cancelled voters, it turned out that the purge was more of a mini-massacre. Records showed more than 13,000 voters had been dropped, about 16 percent of the 80,000 La Porte voters registered in 2008. Jones has asked for a Justice Department investigation.
SNIP
The purge was supervised by the county’s Republican co-director of voter registration, Donna Harris, who happens to be married to La Porte County Republican Chairman Keith Harris, who appointed her to the job in February 2010. He also happens to be on the ballot this year, as a candidate for circuit court clerk. (He ran unsuccessfully for other offices prior to hiring his wife). Much of the pruning of the rolls was done while the Democratic co-director was out for three months on medical leave.
Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/election-2012/wp/2012/10/26/voter-purge-in-key-indiana-county-goes-overboard/
The purge was supervised by the county’s Republican co-director of voter registration, Donna Harris, who happens to be married to La Porte County Republican Chairman Keith Harris, who appointed her to the job in February 2010.
Much of the pruning of the rolls was done while the Democratic co-director was out for three months on medical leave.
You have to be absolutely fucking kidding me.
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DCKit
(18,541 posts)there'd be far fewer Republicans in office.
It's what they do.
Botany
(77,324 posts)
?w=381&h=569
ChaoticTrilby
(211 posts)I can just imagine how he'd react to hearing about the "Proud Democratic" United States having all this election fraud. With the Republicans doing everything in their power to control the vote, it's hilarious that they're the ones who are calling Obama a "communist." Look who's talking! 
Diclotican
(5,095 posts)ChaoticTrilby
If Joseph Stalin had been alive today, he would have had a field day about how the republicans time and time and time again is cheating, stealing and other vice make Voting a joke in the United States of America.. He would have make Pravda, the official newspaper in USSR, drooling for weeks at a time, to show how bad "democracy" did it in US, and that they should be happy to have a leader with a firm hand on the ship...
I guess, Lenin, Stalin, and the lot of communist leaders in USSR, now is having a good time, looking down from whatever place they are today - to look about how things are in USA of today.. At least Joseph Stalin var brutally honest about the election stuff - you vote for me, or you have a nice time in Siberia the next couple of years...
It IS a reason OSCE is sending people who should keep an eye on polling stations around in the US, as the last couple of elections have been, at least doubtfully, and where the irregularity about elections have smeared more than one election... And it is pretty clear, that the republicans - or at least they who have the power, doesn't enjoy been looked over their shoulder - in case not everything goes as planned. After all, OSCE is an organization, who have people who know how to look for election troubles... They have been in "mine field" in many cases to get elections as honest as it is possible under difficult situations...
The US of yesterday - who I might believe most of us on the outside still have a image at, as a reality in US, is on the road to a wreck it looks like.. More and more and more the republicans is making more and more desperate measures to make their own reality, a real reality.. Not something they talk about in looked up rooms, where no one is allowed to be... The blatant disrespect mr Romney was showing, to all to se at a private found raising diner (to the sum of 50.000 a peace, so I hope the dinner was great) is rather symbolic of the outright disdain the higher ups in the Republican Party, is showing for the large parts of the american electorate... You might have disdain for the "little man" but you doesn't tell it outright as mr Romney did - in the age of digital electronic, where you can be taped Crystal clear - you better watch what you say - someone can - and will tape it, if you talk like mr Romney did - and with the candid support of the people who was in the room (not the servants, but they who was at the dinner).. And with a few ones out there, who have just disdain for "the little people" at a whole..
It is ironic of sorts - the one thing who kept the "elite" from doing away with unions, and what we today Will call the "middle class" was the fear that enough people would try out the communists - it WAS the fear on the conservative side, in the 1920s and 1930s all over the world, and FDRs New Deal at least solved some of the causes for a rather radical solutions from the "lower classes" in US... And the cold war with their fear of labor rights - and union bustings the last 30 or so years, also have made a dent in a radical solutions to the problems in the US... But to be honest - how long will the working man and woman in the US, accepting what they are been treated as in the future?.. In 1905, a couple of years before the great war, and the great Revolutions of February and October 1917, a all powerfully Russian Emperor could state - the State and the Empire is at peace and the population is loving and caring for their Monarch and the government... in 1917, after Imperial Russia had lost the first world war, and the state was in a state of nuclear disaster - not able to govern outside of St Petersburg, and with a State in despairs, the Emperor had to leave his crown and go into a form of intern excil, for him, and for the royal familiy it ended rather bad, they was killed by revolutionaries in Yekaterinburg on the other side of the Ural mountains - in Sibiria... And most of the royals was either hunted down and killed - put in camps, or had to flee to whoever wanted to give them a harbor for their security...
I just hope, that would not be the case for the US, as revolutions, is painfully, hurtfully and tragically...
Diclotican
CurtEastPoint
(20,024 posts)Botany
(77,324 posts)The republicans know that demographics and time is against them so they
have to cheat. Be it voter ID laws, dirty machines, purging voter rolls,
throwing away democratic voter registrations, cutting back early voting hours,
giving false voting information and God only knows what else ...... these
are not republicans but criminals and they should be in jail for this crap.
liberalmike27
(2,479 posts)It's an easy choice. You change your platform, you remove the racism, you get a bit more sane, you allow for a few tax increases for upper levels, you allow the perfectly logical removal of corporate tax cuts, and things like allowing medicare/medicaid bargaining for drugs to save money.
With that, of course, it allows the Democrats to move back into old, more comfortable times too.
I guess to be more accurate, cheating is the only way to win, and not give ground and move back from the insanity that has overtaken their party. And they do NOT, want to do that, it would seem. So...cheating it is.
BlueCaliDem
(15,438 posts)WTF is wrong with Republicans?? They're like petulant, pouting twelve-year-olds who lie, cheat, steal, and get temper tantrums if they don't get their way.
When will American finally wake up and give the entire Republican Party the boot??
Firebirds01
(576 posts)Its like punching your wife but you said sorry and bought her a rose afterwards. these people should be in jail now.
BlueCaliDem
(15,438 posts)of making breakfast and coffee.
But sheesh. The moment the Democrat is out of sight, Republicans swoop in and try to lie, cheat, and steal. I mean, the Democrat was only away for three months!
I agree. There should be a law outlining the hefty fines and jail time for shenanigans like this.
EC
(12,287 posts)get so pissed that if they were not planning on voting before, will now. Some of those 11,000 could have been people that don't vote much and were going to sit it out...now maybe not.
This guy shouldn't be allowed to run anymore since it's obvious him and his wife were plotting for him to win by cheating. She didn't do it without him putting her there just for that purpose. And since he couldn't win before, I'd look into how he got where he is now...there was someone else setting him up somewhere.
silvershadow
(10,336 posts)the action and these two nitwits will take the fall. Texas companies are now here, infiltrating the schools from what I understand. Mitch Daniels, our Governor and Bush's former budget director, probably talks to Rove a dozen times a day, by cell. Mike Pence is running to replace him. Mourdock is just a case, who was flying under the radar until he dropped a fetus on his foot. Indiana is on a state level what the entire election is about, in my mind. It would be delicious to drive a stake in it's heart here. They try to act like Indiana is "deep" red. My ass. Indiana is only more reddish after they busted the unions and sent those people to Texas and Kansas. There is a lot of GM retirees here. Of course, a lot retired to other places too. I wish Ed would highlight that the Ampad facility Bain closed was in Indiana. He talks about it closing, but not much about Indiana. If he would just drop in an "Indiana" a smidge more often it might motivate Indiana voters even more. (Can you tell I'm wanting a sweep here? lol)
dotymed
(5,610 posts)that great state has been over run with these scumbags.
formercia
(18,479 posts)Looks like Reconstruction.
silvershadow
(10,336 posts)will wake up to that fact one day.
ProudProgressiveNow
(6,189 posts)smh
ffr
(23,399 posts)16,000 voters purged is significant and blatant.
Firebirds01
(576 posts)The got too greedy and got caught. Obama won Ohio in 2008 by 22 votes per district. How easy would it be to skim a could dozen here and there.....May not seem like much but that's how these people win.
What is worse, a black panther member standing outside a voting precint in a heavily african american community or a republican election official blocking 13k people from voting?
Average republicans will unfortunately see no problem with this "cause teh Acorn was teh let illeagle immigrants vote and stuff."
rsweets
(310 posts)i hope this applies here
barbtries
(31,308 posts)my GAWD. it's sickening the corruption of republicans.
GoldenOldie
(1,540 posts)With all of this occurring throughout the country, why is this not being addressed immediately by our Justice Department? I don't want on-going hearings, after the elections are over. I am really, really old and I have never seen nor heard of this outright tampering with Federal elections in my lifetime.
We send individuals to jail for small things, such as small amounts of marijuana, kiting checks, etc., yet we totally allow major felons who totally steal our Democracy to walk free? I just don't understand and neither would my family who fought and died to protect these rights.
Firebirds01
(576 posts)Justice department goes after them and then the scream that "Obama is trying to control our elections." They probably think its more trouble then what it is worth......which is a stupid, stupid notion.
Elections held at the state level dont work because of this.
EC
(12,287 posts)why isn't it more of a big deal than a little item in the back of local news? The network stations should be shaming them on national tv and making a big deal of the trials and convictions.
AAO
(3,300 posts) Nine
(1,741 posts)Pure sleaze. These people have no shame.
Tippy
(4,610 posts)But it's ok if you are a republican...NOT they are sealing our votes and it is against the law but who will do anything about it? This is a big deal...HOLDER was warned but did little if anything...to stop thisThe Republican party is full of liers and cons from the top to the bottom....
SunSeeker
(58,283 posts)So many felonies, so little time, eh Repukes?
LisaL
(47,423 posts)If some of the purged voters didn't try to vote early, this wouldn't have been discovered until the election. They would show up and be told they are not eligible.
In other words, if not for early voting, these people would be denied their right to vote.
winstars
(4,279 posts)Polls don't mean shit if your people CAN'T VOTE!!!
DirtyDawg
(802 posts)...people like this pay a price for their heinous, illegal, behavior, why would they, or people like them, stop? I don't know what would do it, but I'd start with pillarying (sp?) in the public square...during the Winter.
Liberalynn
(7,549 posts)
MrYikes
(720 posts)A soldier is asked to give his all to protect our country, these people should be asked to give their all for trying to take it away.
SCVDem
(5,103 posts)Last edited Sat Oct 27, 2012, 12:52 PM - Edit history (1)
Meanwhile, while everyone's distracted they work their evil magic.
Voter Fraud = Death Penalty
For too many, that's what it took to get the right.
Why should it be different for those who would steal it?
Ford_Prefect
(8,613 posts)I guess if it's not an easy drug bust or a setup pseudo-terrorist they aren't interested?
We need to close the DOJ so we can open the new and improved Ministry of The Convenient Truth!!!
BumRushDaShow
(169,760 posts)then it is not happening? 
It boggles the mind.
flamingdem
(40,891 posts)the Obama legal peeps in Ohio had dealt with over 2000 cases of voter irregularities, suppression already.
I wish we could hear more about it but they're well aware of what the Republicans are attempting to pull off!
INdemo
(7,024 posts)ads here in my area of Indiana (red)and it made me kinda wonder if Indiana may be coming into play?
But the area with the voter purge is a solid blue area(heavily populated area) going all the way across the northern part and turning red in the tiny northeast corner...
With the northwest area and a couple other small blue areas, Indiana could turn blue again..Just maybe these bas*^ds must suspect this and decided to play this game
..But yes we need Federal intervention because these damn Repukes sure as hell wont do anything..hell.... this wont even make the local news.
flamingdem
(40,891 posts)Their brains have been infected and they are beyond hope.
They've binged and we must purge!
freshwest
(53,661 posts)There are a lot of local, county and state races that people don't follow closely, because so much is made of the national races. But disengaging from the less publicized local and state races are what made this mess. People can't just hold their nose and say they don't want to be involved in political life, because these elected official write the laws that affect our lives, from our bodies to what is being taught in schools, what we will be paying taxes. Hate radio has taken in a lot of people who haven't thought any deeper than the lastest sound bite. This is never what the Founding Fathers intended, we need citizens to be knowledgeable in many fields.
Especially, don't allow any more GOP Secretaries of State, County Commissioner, Election Board members, Attorney Generals, or whatever office does these things in our respective communiites and states. The school boards, utility districts, and many offices are infiltrated with the GOP mafia in many states. It's tedious and there's no glamour involved to these jobs, no media attention. This is how they've taken over in so many states.
I check out every office in my state, which is blue, and has a huge voter book to read. Check the party and know what groups are endorsing them and what actions they've done in the past. Review the words for and against, check those who speak against them as well. Many citizens don't know who is funding or what philosophy drives groups that sound liberal or progressive. When weighed in the actions they've taken in the past, they are found to corporatists.
Watch for Teahadist dog whistles by challengers in their resume of reasons why they are asking for your vote. If possible, inform yourself or talk to a friend who is a good Democrat and knows them, don't let the GOP do this anymore.
flamingdem
(40,891 posts)because it's very time consuming to wade through the disinformation or poorly presented information.
I am just getting involved with local city council elections because I realize how critical they are and how developer money is pouring in -- and has already secured many candidates who are wrecking our city by overdevelopment.
There are many incompetents and Republican mafia as you say sneaking in at the lower levels, in some cases calling themselves Independent.
They know most people are uniformed, we have to make it "cool" and important to be informed!
bkkyosemite
(5,792 posts)Please rec and read my thread. We must take action to perserve our right to vote and to perserve our Country. Hopefully there will be a list coming to help in contacting those and bring this out into the public. We are a large group here. We can Yes We Can make a difference.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021636998
Botany
(77,324 posts)Voting Section, 202-307-2767
******************
It was just a "mistake in the training of some workers." 
Donna Harris did not return a phone message Friday. But Keith Harris said that there was no wrongdoing. “What I think actually happened was inadequate training, which resulted in a misunderstanding of the process,” he said. “That led to this unfortunate incident happening. I don’t mean to minimize the seriousness of it. We need to look at this and see what kind of checks and balances need to be put in place.”
HooptieWagon
(17,064 posts)Republican election thieves should be prosecuted and jailed. This was no accident.
Botany
(77,324 posts)these f***ers need to be in jail.
MAD Dave
(204 posts)It must be extremely frustrating being the first and seemingly only line of defense against the coordinated attack of the Republicans.
glinda
(14,807 posts)If not corrected before the final tally I sincerely believe game over.
Warpy
(114,615 posts)They cheat.
aintitfunny
(1,424 posts)Is there any solution to this for this election? They should not get away with it for this election, it should not be a "too late" proposition. It has been discovered now and it needs to be fixed so that voters are not denied their right to vote.
I just keep reading about one criminal vote suppressing maneuver after another, but I am not seeing if there is a solution for this election. Shouldn't it be more than a talking point?
Hestia
(3,818 posts)the process brought to the federal level. We need to go back to the National I.D. conversation and really think about it - if everyone has this type of I.D., then there is no problem of having to prove who you are, right?. It was shut down due to biometrics. Other countries don't have these problems of 50 different registration processes with different rules of who is allowed to vote or not. To me, once you turn 18 you automatically registered to vote. Why can't we have it this way? Why make people go through the onerous process of opting in?
Why aren't the voting machines not federal and not hackable? Bringing up the ATM argument, why not make voting as important as money?
The election is too important to have to turn out that some 15-minute wanna-be who wants their fame, for ill or for good.
asjr
(10,479 posts)Does anyone know of a law that would disallow the state to hold an election until after it has been investigated? As far as I am concerned this is a criminal act. This is how we will lose. Can a candidate stop this sort of thing? I wonder if the Dept of Justice is monitoring the overwhelming evidence that this is going on all over the country? Oh, hell don't pay any attention to me but I have never been so angry in my entire life. I am asking questions that I can't answer. But I feel this is the last decent election for the entire country and hate to see it be highjacked.
toby jo
(1,269 posts)without a doubt we could come up with 90 minutes of material - ready for release before the next pres election
Plucketeer
(12,882 posts)we got a fresh attorney general - one that's not afraid of controversy and confrontation - one that's something more than a just warm body. 
Glamrock
(12,003 posts)In my own fucking county now?
Coyotl
(15,262 posts)It is time to establish a national voter registration tracking system with required local reporting of any and all changes in registrations.
Public records requests should be made to every election board in the country, get the data and put them on notice.
triplepoint
(431 posts)Last edited Sat Oct 27, 2012, 01:49 PM - Edit history (2)
Went to Purdue there, and NEVER could figure out those assholes. They refused to set their clocks to daylight savings time when that system was specifically set up for them. What a wasted state....and now this. Not surprised at all. The "birthplace" of the KKK for that state is Kokomo, Indiana...just a few miles down the road from Purdue/West Laughalot, Indianoplace. They even had a display window in the Student Union building in a lame attempt to recruit new members! We had student racists burning crosses (made out of computer punch cards) on campus--outside the dorm windows of African-American students. Coretta S. King came to speak about it at a massive backlash rally afterwards. I got to meet Sam Day; Editor of "Progressive Magazine" at that rally.
When South African Apartheid was in "full bloom," we built a small shantytown replica, and began a pro-divestment/anti-Apartheid Occupation on the grass area outside the Admin building. Pro-Apartheid (Really!) students came by with watermelon and fried chicken. There was a student-student confrontation of course. It even made the cover of Newsweek. Nothing seemed to get resolved except the makeshift shantytown had to go..
The birthstate of unreconstructed racist Earl Butz,** Indiana now seems bent on revisiting their past, and possibly staying there.....I earned two Masters in two different fields of engineering there, and that was the ONLY reason I was hung up there in that wasteland of a state.
Now, it is quite obvious that the Hoosiers have completely forgotten their "Underground Railroad" past, and have gone back to the future with their racism-based electioneering tactics. So, what else ISN'T new?
**
“The only thing the coloreds
are looking for in life
are tight pussy, loose shoes
and a warm place to shit."
News outlets revealed that Butz had made a racist remark in front of entertainer Pat Boone and former White House counsel John Dean while aboard a commercial flight to California following the Republican National Convention.
The October 18, 1976 issue of Time let the cat out of the bag:
Butz started by telling a dirty joke involving intercourse between a dog and a skunk. When the conversation turned to politics, Boone, a right-wing Republican, asked Butz why the party of Lincoln was not able to attract more blacks. The Secretary responded with a line so obscene and insulting to blacks that it forced him out of the Cabinet last week and jolted the whole Ford campaign. Butz said that "the only thing the coloreds are looking for in life are tight p – - – - , loose shoes and a warm place to s – - -."
Dean used the line in Rolling Stone, attributing it to an unnamed Cabinet officer. But New Times magazine enterprisingly sleuthed out Butz’s identity by checking the itineraries of all Cabinet members. Some newspapers published the remark. Others stated only that Butz had said something too obscene to print, and invited their readers to contact the editors if they wanted more information. The San Diego Evening Tribune offered to mail a copy of the whole quotation to anyone who requested it; more than 3,000 readers did. Butz was forced to resign his cabinet post on October 4, 1976. He became the most sought–after Republican speaker on the lecture and after dinner circuits, and was named dean emeritus of Purdue University’s School of Agriculture. That’s the story the "mainstream" newspaper editors were protecting all you young voters from.
Reference Link;
http://lukeford.net/blog/?p=2137
Response to Firebirds01 (Original post)
savebigbird This message was self-deleted by its author.
DallasNE
(8,008 posts)The criteria is to be an American citizen that still lives at the address on the registeration. There is no expiration date -- check the law. The address can be checked electronically using a Postal Service database so why don't they use this feature. It is not rocket science.
savebigbird
(417 posts)I'm suspicious that they originally intended to purge 800 and ended up purging over 2,000. Like you said-it is pretty simple to check eligibility of voters. Do why was their original number so much lower than their end number? Seems fishy to me!
DallasNE
(8,008 posts)Starting with nepotism. How can that be legal in this day and age. Is Indiana really that backwards? Second is lack of oversight caused by this nepotism. Third is bypassing procedures. Lastly, when the Democrat was on medical leave another Democrat should have been named as a temporary replacement. Nobody can accidentially make this many mistakes so it had to be deliberate. Bring out the indictments. Lets get started.
lexw
(804 posts)Those freaks/cheaters/liars probably did something to put the Democratic co-director out on 3-month leave.
It seemed like a well orchestrated plan.
This must be going on everywhere in the country. It's no wonder Romney is so smug, he knows it's being pieced together for him.
Scurrilous
(38,687 posts)
iemitsu
(3,891 posts)should be null and void. Citizens, who would have to pay for a second election cycle, should be given all the information about how the tampering was executed and be given all the names of individuals and groups involved.
Candidates associated with cheating like this should be barred from running from public office, for life.
And precincts involved should be required to return to paper and hand counted ballots.
These measures and a few people in jail might stop this travesty to our election systems.
JimDandy
(7,318 posts)Fire ALL of their officers! Seriously! They weren't staying on top of one of their most important jobs-to protect the voter rolls. Jeeeez.
Botany
(77,324 posts).... this was done when the democrat working at the BOE was out sick and
he or she did not come back and was told by the repugs that they just
committed a crime by purging eligible voters.
This has been going on for years now .... in 2004 a republican (whose husband
is in prison for stealing state money and funneling to W bush), Bernadette NOE,
in Toledo, OH allowed republicans many days to go and "fix up" the county's BOE
voter rolls and as a result many people who voted in the November election had
their votes not count. In Westerville, OH (central OH) a pediatrician who has lived
in the same house for 20+ years found out on election day he was no longer
registered to vote.
Glamrock
(12,003 posts)Fuck these cheating, slimy, motherfuckers. I'll be taking election day off and doing whatever my local Obama office asks of me. I've had it. Enough is fucking enough.
kooljerk666
(776 posts)They have a dysfunctional belief system (all they hold as TRUE is false) & death & destruction for anybody or everybody is hunky dory as long as their system of lies & myth prevails. Who cares how many are hurt or killed, as long as they get their way.
&feature=fvwrel
WOMEN SEEK HIS POWER........ sounds like a typical grey faced old man w/ a $3 haircut.
Supersedeas
(20,630 posts)april
(1,148 posts)
Curmudgeoness
(18,219 posts)the number of Democrats and the number of Republicans who were in this purge. Without that information, I cannot determine how much outrage I should feel. (Although I do have to say that the fact that it was done by a Repub at a time when the Dem was on medical leave gives me the shivers.)
TeamPooka
(25,577 posts)Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)There were Republicans saying that anyone who didn't vote when they took the House in 2010 shouldn't be able to vote in 2012.
Canuckistanian
(42,290 posts)Where are you?
Oh, yeah, shutting down MMJ establishments. I forgot.
0rganism
(25,646 posts)One does not simply ... go on medical leave with a Republican in charge of the election process.
renate
(13,776 posts)
Shuhered
(200 posts)Sick Thieves!!!!
blkmusclmachine
(16,149 posts)
Don C. Nuttin
(84 posts)Vote early. As early as possible. Many states permit voting at county election offices tomorrow during business hours. The only way --as a practical matter-- to be dead certain your vote counts is to go in a week early so there is time to sort it out if the Republicans have messed you up.