PD's Sam Fulwood: Adding up facts on Blackwell action

[Kolesar]

Succinct and strident!
...excerpt...
To refresh my memory, I asked Plain Dealer newsroom researcher Cheryl Diamond to help review and double-check the news stories leading up to and immediately following the 2004 election that involved Blackwell's many troubling decisions.

Here's a bit of what we found:

Voter registration forms: In the closing days of the state's registration period, Blackwell announced that valid registration forms had to be printed on 80-pound stock paper. Regulations calling for registration forms to be printed on postcard-thick paper dated back to a pre-computerized time, but they had long been overlooked. So why the sudden enforcement? Well, Blackwell issued the order after this newspaper announced plans to print a registration form in the paper and ask readers to send the filled-out forms to the Ohio secretary of state's office. The forms were intended as a public service, pure and simple.

Blackwell didn't offer a plausible defense of his nitpicking decision to accept only thick paper forms, but he backed down after being embarrassed by the public backlash to his pettiness.

Voter challenges: It took a decision by a federal judge to stop a Blackwell-backed plan to review the legitimacy of new voter registrations in Cuyahoga and six other Ohio counties with large black populations. The judge's decision came as dozens of angry voters showed up to defend their right to vote in Summit County, forcing the Board of Elections to dismiss nearly 1,000 objections filed by local Republican officials.

Provisional balloting: Before the election, Blackwell ruled that Ohio voters who appeared at the polls without their names on the voter lists wouldn't have their ballots counted if they showed up at the wrong precinct. Instead of allowing them a so-called provisional ballot - which could be checked later for accuracy - Blackwell ruled their votes would be invalid.

Partisan challengers in polls: While state law allows political parties to place monitors in the polls on Election Day, Blackwell redefined that law to allow one challenger per precinct. Such loose interpretation of the law meant that partisan activists could clog polling stations with several precincts inside them. This unnecessary ruling led to widespread fears in black neighborhoods that hired GOP rabble-rousers would flood their precincts to unfairly challenge their right to vote. I call that attempted vote suppression.

http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/sam_fulwood/index.ssf?/base/opinion/115321148751350.xml&coll=2

[OnTheOtherHand]

1. word.

Public officials ought to do everything in their power to bring people into the political process, not limit or exclude voting.

I believe Blackwell - serving as President Bush's state party chairman and Ohio's secretary of state - exhibited a shameful pattern of partisan meddling that bordered on disenfranchisement.

(One nitpick -- yes, I do sometimes nitpick: AFAIK Blackwell was co-chair of Bush's reelection campaign in Ohio, not "Bush's state party chairman.")

[Kolesar]

2. good catch ... eom

[roseBudd]

3. My Blackwell flyer for download...

http://bushcheated04.com/blackwell2.pdf

[Wilms]

4. K&R n/t