GOP Acts to Disenfranchise Voters in Ohio

To all those who naively believe -- or intentionally pretend -- that the GOP push for Voter ID laws isn't about disenfranchising voters (that'd be you, @), we have more obvious and patently anti-democratic tactics from the GOP in Ohio.

A few weeks ago, Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted successfully reduced early-voting weekends from one to five. Why? Because early voting on the weekends helps blue collar workers who might otherwise not be able to vote. A last-minute decision by the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals forced Husted to reinstate the last weekend.

Darn.

Last Friday, at 6pm -- the last possible moment such an order could have been executed -- Husted issued a directive contrary to his own standard in how ballots are accepted.

In short, the standard Husted endorsed, and the process Ohio agreed to in a consent decree, declares that if a ballot is missing the type of ID used to verify the identity of the voter, the poll worker fills in this information.

Viz:

Ohio Rev. Code § 3505.181(B)(6) provides that, once a voter casting a provisional ballot proffers identification, "the appropriate local election official shall record the type of identification provided, the social security number information, the fact that the affirmation was executed, or the fact that the individual declined to execute such an affirmation and include that information with the transmission of the ballot . . . ."

The directive Husted entered at the last minute was to require that the voter enter this information themselves. Now, if the ballot is information is missing, the ballot worker fills in nothing, the poll worker does nothing, the information is missing and the ballot is not counted

But, you know, Republicans ONLY concern is that no voter fraud transpires.

Ayuh.