It is no coincidence that Attorney General Eric Holder recently declared open season on state voter identification laws. It is a tactic from the Democrat Party playbook designed to make it easier for ineligible voters to break the law by obtaining a ballot in the upcoming presidential election.
At a staged media event, Holder castigated states' voter ID laws alleging the rules disenfranchise minorities and vowed to use the vast resources of the Justice Department to block their enforcement. His gambit casts a long shadow over the general election in light of allegations of voter fraud in the 2008 contest.
It has been well documented that discredited community activist organization ACORN registered thousands of new voters who helped Obama claim the White House. Last year, ACORN officials pleaded guilty of running an illegal voter registration scheme in Nevada. The group faced similar accusations in other states.
Meanwhile, there is fresh evidence the nation's voting roles are replete with errors and inaccuracies. For instance, the non-partisan Pew Center issued a report in February that showed there are 1.8 million dead people still carried on the voting roles.
Researchers also discovered about 25 million voter registrations were either invalid or contained inaccuracies. That is 13 percent of the nation's total registered voters. More than 2.75 million people are registered in more than one state, Pew reported.
The requirement of a picture identification would eliminate most of the problems unearthed by the Pew Center, while ensuring the integrity of elections.
However, voter ID opponents are unmoved. The ACLU recently declared voter fraud is virtually non-existent and harangued states for enacting ID requirements that stifle turnout, particularly among minorities. Apparently, the ACLU believes only minorities are ill-equipped to secure a valid ID.
The ACLU's claims ring hollow. The organization filed suit in Georgia after the 2008 election, fuming over state ID laws because they prevented minorities from exercising their right to vote. A federal judge tossed the case because the liberal group could not produce a single person who would testify that he or she was unable to vote because of the ID law.
That's why Holder's battle to overturn ID laws is nothing more than a political smokescreen. The dour-faced attorney general wants to create the impression that the administration cares more about protecting minority voters than Republicans. Only the most gullible would fall for such deceit.
No one, including the attorney general, has presented a shred of evidence that minorities are disadvantaged by voter ID laws. Opponents often cite the cost of obtaining ID as a roadblock. Yet many states offer picture identification cards for free, including Texas.
Besides, it is virtually impossible to function as a U.S. citizen without a picture ID. A photo identification is required to fly on an airplane, to drive a car, to purchase cigarettes and liquor, to open a bank account, to validate credit card purchases and to take a college entrance exam.
And the list goes on and on. Illinois recently approved a law that makes it mandatory to produce a photo ID to purchase drain cleaners.
Moreover, photo identification is needed to enter many business offices and government buildings, including the Justice Department. Using Holder's own logic, the attorney general is turning away minorities from his taxpayer-funded building because they can't obtain a valid ID.
A journalist recently exposed the fallacy of Holder's voter ID doctrine. The writer obtained a ballot for a District of Columbia election by simply providing Holder's name and address. The stunt should have embarrassed the nation's top law enforcement officer.
Holder was nonplussed. The nation's voters can draw only one logical conclusion from his reaction. The attorney general isn't interested in fair elections where only legally eligible voters can participle.
Shame on Eric Holder. He is guilty of putting sleazy politics ahead of honest elections. Americans can no longer trust him to uphold the nation's laws.
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