General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsTea Party Group Blocks Florida Voters, Stops Water Handouts at Polls
Voters stand in line during the fourth day of early voting in North Miami, Tuesday, October 30, 2012, as Floridians cast their ballot seven days before Election Day. (AP Photo/Alan Diaz)
Update @5:45 pm pm ET: An independent analysis of the list of names challenged by Tampa Vote Fairs Kimberly Kelley reveals the list is 40 percent black, which compares to 15 percent of registered voters who are black. Political scientists Daniel Smith of University of Florida and Michael Herron of Dartmouth College identified 73 people on the list using voter ID numbers in the Florida voter file. They also found just 16 percent of the voters on the list were registered as Republicans, compared to 33 percent of county voters. Were essentially seeing the privitzation of voter suppression, says Smith, and that should be highly disconcerting. Now we have private citizens through this organization Tampa Vote Fair doing their own data mining and matching and challenging potential citizens at the polls.
Tea Party activists in Floridas largely black and electorally significant Interstate 4 corridor have worked furiously to put a damper on what has been a record-setting turnout thus far. In one of the most striking examples of voter suppression to emerge, Voting Rights Watch obtained a list of several dozen Hillsborough County voters who will be surprised to learn they cannot vote regular ballots thanks to last-minute challenges filed against them.
Ive requested similar information from Miami-Dade, Orange, Pinellas and Seminole counties, but officials have not responded. A spokesperson for the Secretary of States Office, Chris Cate, said the state does not track voter challenges, so there is no way of knowing how widespread these sorts of challenges may be.
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The Controversy Over Bottled Water
Kelleys challenges arent the only ones Tampa voters needed to worry about during the early voting period. Last Friday and Saturday, the last two official days of early voting, black voters and NAACP members were upset when Republican poll watchers challenged NAACP members for passing out water and offering chairs to voters standing in long lines in the hot sun.
Black voters have been turning out in record numbers, not only in Tampa but throughout the state. There are reports of people standing in line up to seven hours, many of them elderly and disabledand at one Orlando site there was a bomb scare.
much more at this link:
http://www.thenation.com/blog/171030/tea-party-group-blocks-florida-voters-stops-water-handouts-polls#
In my opinion the whole world is watching......again
russspeakeasy
(6,539 posts)ornotna
(10,797 posts)This kind of crap happens all over the US.
russspeakeasy
(6,539 posts)Zalatix
(8,994 posts)Teabaggers who tried that in almost all areas in California would get their asses STOMPED.
roguevalley
(40,656 posts)Zoeisright
(8,339 posts)And the local papers there were always full of old fuckers voting against any kind of improvement because it wouldn't benefit THEM. I haven't been back to that state in 20 years because I will not give those repulsive repukes my vacation money. Florida has not changed one tiny little bit.
bluestate10
(10,942 posts)southern states by a large margin. The job is to win Florida on Tuesday, then vote out Scott and republicans in 2014.
russspeakeasy
(6,539 posts)You gotta be shittin me.
vaberella
(24,634 posts)Eleanors38
(18,318 posts)Florida went for Obama in 2008.
Don't confuse the hard-right with the rest of the state.
Dalai_1
(1,301 posts)Just when we thought it couldn't get worse this happens...these people in these lines
are our heroes for sure.
Thank you for posting this ,Mira!
renate
(13,776 posts)We won't ever know all their names but we owe them a huge debt, whether or not Florida goes blue. They are showing just how messed up the voting system is in Florida and they are doing their part so that future voters won't have to go through this crap, because Rick Scott looks BAD.
Dalai_1
(1,301 posts)with the BushV Gore election..surely President Obama will address
it in some way by the time he leaves his second term in office..
Rick Scott reminds me of a rodent btw!
codjh9
(2,781 posts)mindwalker_i
(4,407 posts)Because every tea partier is a fucking asshole,
But every fucking asshole is not a tea partier.
codjh9
(2,781 posts)AmBlue
(3,107 posts)Bozita
(26,955 posts)Yup. Vote for them because they're on your side!
Fawke Em
(11,366 posts)If some TeaPug got in my face, I'd tell them to back off. We white people need to be out there helping.
I've been calling tonight. Found a bunch or weary voters, but a few who are prObama.
Dalai_1
(1,301 posts)are the "attorney's on the ground" only there for voter fraud or
would they address the issue in this OP?
Fawke Em
(11,366 posts)My question is: are people helping?
I'm helping in my piss-ant state.
Are white folks helping in that state?
Mister Ed
(5,926 posts)These evil scumbags are going down. They will not prevail.
renate
(13,776 posts)No blood, but the intent is the same, and it is un-American.
Our work has just begun...we have to get them ALL out of our
electorate....
RedCloud
(9,230 posts)Dalai_1
(1,301 posts)they are tired and only wanting to vote,they hope
their effort is not thwarted !
Zalatix
(8,994 posts)Why is it that all the bullies are ACROSS THE COUNTRY?
I want a piece of that action. Let me have a "talk" with those punks.
ThoughtCriminal
(14,047 posts)That nobody in those lines is voting for Romney.
I don't see how they can have any jurisdiction past where the line extends outside of the limits.
PD Turk
(1,289 posts)enough of this shit
Zoeisright
(8,339 posts)Their "supposed hero".
Change has come
(2,372 posts)LeftInTX
(25,201 posts)I haven't seen anything like this since the early 60s
The Tea Party is scum - KKK