As the Colorado Independent’s John Tomasic reports:
In the last two years, Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler has made voter fraud prevention a top priority. His efforts have included working to stop county clerks from sending absentee ballots to inactive voters, lobbying for a controversial voter ID law and leading an unprecedented effort to determine whether noncitizens are voting in the state.
Critics have questioned Gessler’s priorities, given that the number of documented incidents of voter fraud in Colorado is tiny…
In an interview with the Weekly Standard, Walker said he thought fraud typically accounted for 2 percent of the vote in the state and likely swayed elections.
Using what we assume is similar “fuzzy math” as Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler, supporters of embattled Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker warn of dire consequences for his recall election next month–implying substantially more than a token number of “fraudulent” voters.
“As we’ve been telling you, the liberal power network is pulling out all the stops to RECALL Gov. Scott Walker. We’ve now received news that liberal judges have teamed up to block Wisconsin’s new Voter ID law,” wrote Walker supporters at the the Campaign to Defeat Obama in an email last month.
“This means we will not be able to fight voter fraud, and this means that our margin of victory must be much larger now [Pols emphasis] – to compensate for any fraudulent ballots cast by RECALL proponents.”
Got that? A “much larger margin of victory” is needed, because the absence of a voter ID law means the state of Wisconsin “will not be able to fight voter fraud.”
Which makes you assume there is a lot of voter fraud in Wisconsin, doesn’t it?
After the 2008 presidential election, Wisconsin Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen and Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm formed an Election Fraud Task Force to investigate.
In February of 2011, the Department of Justice released a statement on the results of that investigation: Authorities charged 11 felons for voting, 6 people for voter registration misconduct and 2 people for voting twice.
So which is it, folks? Will the margin that decides Wisconsin’s gubernatorial recall election next month be fewer than 20 votes, or are these scare-tactic warnings that vote fraudsters are lining up to steal Walker’s recall election in need of a reality check?
Don’t feel bad, we can’t get a good explanation for this discrepancy from our Scott, either.
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This assumes both that there is a lot of voter fraud (as you point out) AND ALSO no way to stop it absent the “new” voter ID law.
I am not a Wisconsin resident (much less a Wisconsin lawyer), but I wonder whether there is really no way at all to stop someone from committing rank fraud absent a “new” law, however few people will really try it.
The article reports that Walker wildly overestimates fraud, putting it at 2 percent of the vote, or roughly 30K to 60K votes– ie, nothing remotely close to the 13 votes the investigation found were illegally cast in Wisconsin in 2008. Yes 13 votes– not even 20. The other 7 charges levied were for registration misconduct and so forth, not for actual votes cast.
Walker obviously knows 60,000 people aren’t casting illegal ballots in Wisconsin. If he doesn’t, that’s a whole other problem.
That said, the scare mongering about voter fraud quoted in the article was put out by his supporters at the national group The Campaign to Defeat Obama. No ties to Walker, at least not formal ties.
We’ve edited–and added the quote from Walker himself. Thanks.
Since when does an “independent” committee use the words “we” and “our” like this? That’s a bit incriminating.
AFAIK, it might as well have been Walker talking.
Even ONE INSTANCE IS TOO MUCH ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS STEALING ELECTIONS STEALING JOBS ENDING OUR AMERICAN WAY OF LIFE TAXING US TO DEATH rabble rabble rabble
Where’s A-GOP when you really need him?
Probably S@#tting bricks over all the alleged voter fraud.
Republicans believe that every voter should be verified to protect the integrity of every vote. If those safeguards aren’t in place, fraud is possible. There’s nothing unreasonable about raising money and raising awareness at the same time.
Democrats have been known to get alarmist in fundraising pitches. “The Ryan Plan Ends Medicare” was Politifact’s lie of the year last year, remember?
If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to donate to Scott Walker now.
They even admitted it when writing their piece.