By Rick Jensen
As expected, “Crooked Hillary†and “Short Fingers Trump†won the New York primary.
Unexpectedly, “Bernie’s Boys and Babes†have cried foul over the purging of the voter rolls, intimating that some nefarious evil has wiped over 125,000 would-be Bernie voters from the lists of eligible voters.
The Brennan Center for Justice in New York has done quite a bit of research on voter roll purging, saying it’s “shrouded in secrecy, prone to error, and vulnerable to manipulation.â€
“Purges, if done properly, are an important way to ensure that voter rolls are dependable, accurate, and up-to-date. Precise and carefully conducted purges can remove duplicate names, and people who have moved, died, or are otherwise ineligible.â€
Far too frequently, however, eligible, registered citizens show up to vote and discover their names have been removed from the voter lists.
Learning that about 126,000 Democratic voters have been stripped from the rolls, the Sanders campaign cried foul.
“From long lines and dramatic understaffing to longtime voters being forced to cast affidavit ballots and thousands of registered New Yorkers being dropped from the rolls, what’s happening today is a disgrace,†Sanders spokesman Karthik Ganapathy said in an email to CNN, calling the difficulties a “shameful demonstration.â€
Speaking to CNN on Tuesday night, Board of Elections Executive Director Michael Ryan pushed back against the growing criticism, saying, “We’re not finding that there were issues throughout the city that are any different than what we experience in other elections.â€
At the time of this writing, the Clinton campaign has ignored requests for comments. Nothing to see here. Move along.
What’s amusing this time around is that Democrats usually use the systematic updating of voter rolls to accuse Republicans of illegally erasing the names of Democrats from the rolls and using that accusation to elicit more campaign donations to fight the “evil Republicans.â€
This time, Hillary is being portrayed as the unnamed villain.
When election officials cannot verify the names and addresses, the names come off the rolls. When those people show up, their vote is recorded on the condition that their eligibility is then verified later.
As explained by the Board of Elections, Of the 126,000 Democratic voters taken off from the rolls in Brooklyn, Ryan said 12,000 had moved out of borough, while 44,000 more had been placed in an inactive file after mailings to their homes bounced back. An additional 70,000 were already inactive and, having failed to vote in two successive federal elections or respond to cancel notices, were removed.
The Sanders swarm will NOT accept this. The fix is in! The rascally Republicans … er… Democrats are obviously out to get those… Democrats?
So here we are in New York, where Democrats are yelling and screaming about “voter suppression†as they do when Republicans emulate Nelson Mandela by calling for voter ID’s.
Still, there must be some right-wing evil-doing in all of this voter suppression, right?
There are three Republicans on the New York City Council. Three.
That leaves 41 Democrats. Obviously, those three Republicans stymie all the good that the Democrats want to achieve and likely snuck into the Board of Elections offices to steal the names of those 126,000 Democrats.
But the complaints came from Brooklyn! Surely that is where the Republicans stole the names, right?
Brooklyn has 16 members in power and they are all Democrats.
Maybe Republican Minority Leader Stephen Mateo swam over from Staten Island and did the dirty deed?
Of course! And he led the five Republican members of the Board of Elections in the purge, slipping by the five Democrats on the board!
Either that, or the purge is actually quite common and readily fixed at the polling places.
Wait! No! Blame “Crooked Hillaryâ€!
That’s not too far-fetched, is it?
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