Reince Priebus, the chairman of the Republican National Committee, backed up Scott Walker's claim of rampant voter fraud, arguing -- against all evidence -- that Republicans have to overcome a great voter fraud hurdle.
"I'm always concerned about voter fraud, you know, being from Kenosha, and quite frankly having lived through seeing some of it happen," Reince Priebus said. "Certainly in Milwaukee we have seen some of it, and I think it's been documented. Any notion that's not the case, it certainly is in Wisconsin. I'm always concerned about it, which is why I think we need to do a point or two better than where we think we need to be, to overcome it."There is no evidence to back any of this up. There is also no word on whether he is now going to actually propose some method of fighting absentee ballot fraud or deal with the allegations that the dead have risen and are voting Republican.
Note further that this type of allegation, while being used as an electoral tactic to drive up base turnout, destroys voter confidence in the system. Both sides have done it in the past, but it is wholly and totally despicable.
For Reince Priebus, the head of the Republican party to boldly proclaim the lie that voter fraud is rampant in Wisconsin is indefensible.
ReplyDeleteFor this site to boldly proclaim that Democrats have made similarly corrosive allegations in the past, without an example, is a false equivalence that is also indefensible.
Keep in mind that Priebus' lie is used to justify his party's voter suppression laws.
While there hasn't been a DNC chair basically attacking the political system as Priebus is, we saw some unfortunate behavior (not by Kerry or the party leadership) in the post-2004 elections.
ReplyDeleteYour definitely correct in linking the attacks to the push for voter ID laws and playing with the voter rolls. But I think the larger point is that this is a huge "sore loser" behavior that throws into disrepute any winner of an election and let's people live with the belief that the other side didn't win, they just cheated. The entire political system is based on accepting defeat.