The mailer looks official. It has big letters marked WARNING and "ELECTION VIOLATION NOTICE," seemingly designed to make you think you're the one violating something, and warns of a "possible fraud being perpetrated." But when you open it, it turns out to be a mailer from the Kentucky Republican Party and Mitch McConnell's committee warning you of "fraudulent information" being spread by the campaign of
his opponent, Alison Grimes.
Mailed in envelopes that blare “ELECTION VIOLATION NOTICE” and state “You are at risk of acting on fraudulent information,” the Kentucky Republican Party issued a letter that accuses Grimes of “blatant lies” about McConnell’s advocacy for a local coal plant and his support from “anti-coal activists like Michael Bloomberg.”
Inside the envelope, you'll find a letter that starts out:
Dear Citizen,
This document serves as notification to you, as a resident of Kentucky and a registered voter in the aforementioned Commonwealth, of fraudulent information that is being deliberately spread to voters in your area.
The information that has been red-flagged as 100% false is being purposely spread by the campaign of the federal candidate named below:
Alison Lundergan Grimes,
... which then launches into a more standard political tirade against Grimes. As Salon's Luke Brinker says, it's "hard to see the mailers as anything but a shameless effort to suppress voter turnout." From the outside of the envelope suggesting that
you are guilty of an "election violation" to the faux-official format and claims of "fraud" by the Grimes campaign, the McConnell campaign appears to be hoping that voters will mistake these mailers for "official" documents warning them against casting a vote for Grimes at all.
That's a desperate move. And it's apparently not beneath supposed GOP leader Mitch McConnell, which tells you a lot about how craven his party has become.
