Pennsylvania House Majority Leader Mike Turzai said Saturday that a recent voter ID law passed in his state "would allow Governor Romney to win Pennsylvania." He included this statement in a list of his party's accomplishments, which critics of the legislation—including a Pennsylvania state senator—say unintentionally revealed the true intentions behind the law.
"The classic definition of a gaffe is when a politician accidentally says something that's true," said Michael Waldman, president of NYU Law's Brennan Center for Justice, on Tuesday's PoliticsNation. "It's as if he took truth serum. I don't know what he was thinking."
Voter ID legislation bars individuals from voting unless they present government-issued identification at polling places. Critics of these laws are not intended to reduce fraud so much as they are supposed to prevent traditionally Democratic constituencies—such as the poor, African Americans and young people, who are all less likely to have the required identification—from voting.
"Voter impersonation, which is the only form of voter fraud that voter ID would address, never occurs in Pennsylvania," said State Senator Daylin Leach, a Pennsylvania Democrat, during the same episode. "There's not one single documented case of it in ten years. This was always about suppressing votes of people who vote the wrong way."
According to the Brennan Center, ten states have passed voter ID laws since the beginning of 2011, including the key swing states of Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin. On PoliticsNation, Waldman estimated that the law would affect as many as 11% of eligible voters nationwide.
In May 1, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported that ACLU of Pennsylvania and other groups were filing a lawsuit to have Pennsylvania's ID law overturned.
"We think it's illegal," Waldman said. "And we hope it's going to be overturned." His organization is involved in numerous lawsuits against ID laws across the country.
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I just wonder where the people who come up, with the idea of doing something like this - where they left their morals and ethics. The next group to lose their fiber will be the lawyers and judges who procrastinate getting these laws reversed.
Are you serious? You need a photo ID to buy cigarettes and alcohol--why shouldn't the process of choosing our future leaders also be protected? I think anyone who fights this has a serious morals and ethics problem with trying to steal elections.
Do you know why you need a photo ID to buy cigarettes and alcohol? Because it's been proven over and over that if you don't, underage people (ineligible) will buy them. But has there been a SINGLE case of voter impersonation in Pennsylvania in the last ten years? No. Your assertion that the process of electing our leaders is somehow corrupt, unless we have voter ID, is absurd.
What are you talking about? He just admitted that he made the id law so that Romney can win, point blank. His intentions were moral less and just outright wrong. Its a complete mockery of the entire voting system. This is honestly the most blatantly corrupt thing I've ever seen in politics. Its horrible. There's absolutely no justification for this. If a democrat did this it would still be wrong. Open your eyes, this isn't about Republicans or Democrats it way bigger than that, its about integrity.
Why are people putting up with this ? We should be voting these awful people out of office.. And there is no amount of ads that could ever change my vote. In fact they just make me mad...... If we don't want to lose America as we know it we are going to have to fight for it.. Go Obama and Biden ...........
He even looks stupid.
Did you hear Mitt Romney, What you often do not hear is the truth not told.
Like the time he stated he created 100,000 jobs.
Only he didn’t tell you most of them were created in the out-sourced countries he sent them to.
Did you hear Romney denounce “Mormons’ practice of One man and many young girls?”
Did you hear Romney say, “I am sorry I was a bully in the private high school I attended?”
Did you hear Romney deny, “the forced cutting of a not outed fellow high school student for being different, for perceived to be gay.”
If Romney believes in Marriage as one man and one woman, he would have to say, “my grandfather was wrong to have left the U.S.A. as a fugitive and having had multi wives.”
If he truly believe in what he is telling you and expecting you to believe it, he would denounce the still active Mormon sects that practice polygamy, often marrying underage girls to well advance aged men. He is not going to tell you that, he is not going to tell you the truth but expects you to believe what you hear, from his surrogates, from other who have super wealth at stake, protecting their wealth interest.
If Romney believed in families he would not submit women to less than adequate health care, to less than adequate protection against abuser, to less than adequate representation of women’s rights and issues.
The truth is what you do not hear from Romney!
I see absolutely nothing wrong with making sure the person casting the ballot is the live American citizen who is registered to vote that they claim to be. It will "allow Mitt Romney to win" by making sure the dead Democrats aren't voting.
You can just look at a person and tell that they're alive. Showing an ID doesn't prove squat about your citizenship. Name ONE instance of a dead person voting in Pennsylvania.
yeah i am all for having only the people that are eligible to vote, vote ,but if the states or feds want to have the law then they should provide the ID just like a SS card,the rest is just BS
IF you can't win fair then cheat!
Ah the American way.....
Republicans held the White House, the House and the Senate for six long years. And they did something no one had ever tried in 200 years of history: they tried to fund two wars by cutting taxes three times. It's that simple. They took everything they inherited: the jobs, the surplus, the stature of our country around the world -- and they squandered it....
Republicans looted the Constitution with the Patriot Act in the same period. Republicans were attacking the rights of gay people in the same period. Who wants to talk about liberty?
Liberty eh? Like taking away someones right to vote?
Please... Republicans are the biggest fakes the world has ever known. Republicans don’t really care about spending. Republicans only care about money that we spend on education and healthcare (things that actually improve society).....but spending three trillion dollars we borrow from China on unnecessary war in Iraq.....Halliburton and Karl Marx approved!!
4500 dead Americans and 100,000 innocent Iraqi civilians’ deaths later and now Republicans care about "life"? I think not.....
They might be able to rouse the bigots and some religious zealots telling others who they can’t marry but the Republican policies of lowering taxes and deregulating have unequivocally failed all but maybe 5% of Americans.
Republicans don’t actually stand for anything, and funny thing is, no one asks them to. Especially their hacks in the payola media; the people who should be asking the hard questions but don't because they want those Republican dollars!
Wow let the lawsuits pour in. I wonder how long this is going to last
This is absurd. The NEA should NOT be supporting a far right wing republican like this guy. I started a petition on change.org to tell them to stop supporting him and condemn his policies. Please sign it, and then share it with everyone on twitter, facebook, etc!