Today a group called Election Protection announced their plans to launch a massive effort to protect voters' rights. From TPM Election Central:
"This will be the largest voter protection effort in the history of the country," project head Jonah Goldman, a longtime civil rights and election reform lawyer, insisted in an interview yesterday with Election Central. The backbone of their effort is a hotline, 866-OUR-VOTE, that voters can call to have their questions answered, and to report problems.
This effort is desperately needed, and ties in with the actions of the DNC and the Obama Campaign in Michigan yesterday, where they sued to stop voter caging on the basis of foreclosed home lists.
I believe that voter suppression is the single biggest danger we face, and so have dedicated my Barack Obama Fundraiser Page to that effort.
More from the article:
A group of civil rights lawyers is launching what it bills as the largest voter-protection effort in American history, planning to raise and spend millions of dollars to station hundreds of lawyers and thousands of volunteers at polling places across the country to help voters having trouble with the polls on Election Day.
...
Election Protection 2008 vows to employ hundreds of lawyers and law students at call centers across the country on Election Day. "We've expanded our volume, our capacity from 2004, and we expect to be able to handle over a quarter of a million calls this time," says Goldman, who's also director of the National Campaign for Fair Elections.
...
Goldman added that the group would also be taking on outright efforts to disenfranchise voters. For instance, we've seen recent allegations that the Michigan Republican Party is trying to prevent people on foreclosure lists from voting -- as well as efforts in Virginia to prevent college students from registering where they go to school.
Please consider donating to Election Protection. They need legal eagles as well as money. Are you a lawyer or law student? Go to their volunteer page and see if you can help.
Yesterday's news that the Obama campaign and the DNC are suing Michigan to prevent voter caging inspired me to create this fundraiser page on behalf of their efforts. I have very little to spare this year, I'm barely making the rent. I intended to donate something eventually, but that action was what inspired me to do it.
I realize that most of you have already donated, many have your own fundraising page, but if you have not donated and intended to, please visit my page here:
Fight Voter Suppression!
I wanted to send a message to the Obama Campaign that this is the one thing they can do that I think is most important. I also wanted to spread the news about this illegal tactic to everyone I knew, and to give them hope that there is a way to combat it.
Here's an excerpt from an article about the lawsuit that Obama and the DNC launched, from the Michigan Messenger:
The Obama campaign and the Democratic National Committee have filed a lawsuit in federal court in Michigan over the Michigan GOP’s plan to use foreclosure lists to challenge voters at the polls, as first reported by the Michigan Messenger.
Bob Bauer, general counsel for the Obama campaign, and Mark Brewer, chairman of the Michigan Democratic Party, announced the lawsuit in a conference call with reporters this afternoon. It was filed on behalf of the campaign, the party and three Michigan residents who have had their houses foreclosed upon in recent months.
Bauer called the GOP plan to use foreclosure lists "a new and especially repellent version of caging." Caging is a technique of challenging voters where they take lists of addresses, mail to them with a "do not forward" marking and if for whatever reason those mailings are returned, they use this as a basis for claiming that the voter no longer lives at the address at which they are registered.
The Messenger has lots of articles related to this tactic.
If officials have to defend every act of voter suppression it will cost them money that they can ill-afford. Voter Suppression must be fought at every level, in every state. Light must be shined on this practice and those who are behind it. Please consider donating anew for the sake of these legal battles. Help tie up voter suppressors in court!
Here's the link again:
Fight Voter Caging!