Judge rescues Pennsylvania citizens from Pennsylvania Republicans. Again:
A state judge issued an order Friday that is expected to block enforcement of Pennsylvania’s strict voter-identification law in the Nov. 5 general election. Local poll workers can ask voters to show IDs if they have them and distribute written material about the law, but they may not tell voters at the polls that photo IDs could be required in future elections, Commonwealth Court Judge Bernard McGinley said.
“There is no value in inaccurate information, and the court does not deem inaccurate information ‘educational.’ It is not a matter of confusion — it is a matter of accuracy,” McGinley wrote. McGinley’s ruling marked the third consecutive election in which enforcement of the law has been blocked by court order.
After legal jousting that reached the state Supreme Court, a judge blocked enforcement in last year’s presidential election and again in this year’s municipal and judicial primary because of lingering concern that it could disenfranchise voters who lacked a valid photo ID.
The preliminary injunction will remain in effect until McGinley decides the case and rules on a request for a permanent injunction
This is the judge’s order (pdf). If you read it, you’ll detect his frustration with Pennsylvania’s inability to competently administer the voting restrictions Pennsylvania Republicans insisted on.
This is a recurring pattern with conservatives. When Ohio put in new voting restrictions in 2006 Republicans made absolutely no effort to put voters on notice or train poll workers. When I worked the polls at the first election after the restrictions went in I discovered that poll workers had no clue how to interpret the new law. My precinct is majority Republican so our “election judge” (head poll worker) is always a Republican. I made a huge fuss over the fact that poll workers were applying the restrictions differently in each of the three precincts that share my polling location. It wasn’t hard to figure out. The precinct tables are close enough that I could hear poll workers telling voters one thing in Five, a different rule in Six and another rule in Seven. Hell, VOTERS could hear it. They were talking to one another. After about six hours of my calling the Board of Elections and asking them to direct untrained poll workers to follow the actual rule the GOP election judge told me he needed me to pass out “I Voted” stickers at the exit door. Problem solved!
If conservatives are incapable of running elections properly perhaps they should stop changing the rules every time their candidate needs to be dragged over the finish line. They’re obviously not up to the management challenge. Recall that Pennsylvania conservatives would have allowed these changes to go in prior to the 2012 election had a judge not stopped them, and it is now August of 2013 and they STILL haven’t figured out how to properly administer the new voting regime they demanded.
McGinley’s ruling marked the third consecutive election in which enforcement of the law has been blocked by court order.
Three times. This is what happens when one hires people who don’t believe that voting is a right to run elections. They simply don’t give a shit whether people are wrongfully disenfranchised or not. When conservatives argue that voting is JUST LIKE cashing a check or any other commercial transaction, they believe it.
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