Page 47 - Preclearance News Today

Department of justice denied them preclearance. theyre now appealing to a federal district course about that. in indiana, that case went to the supreme court in 2008 and the supreme court ruled that law was constitutional and the state did have a legitimate reason to want to improve the electoral process. so ultimately this will be decided by the courts. >> mara, charles and kelly wilkinsons debut on "the panel." thank you all for joining us tonight. >> thank you. coming up, rush limbaugh is b...

Texas and south carolina are under these preclearance reviews required from some concept orders back in the 1960s. were now in 2012, enough already. >> julian, can you speak to this? ill tell you the e-mails were going to get. theyre going to say voting is a privilege, its not a right. you have to show your photo id to drive a car, as jay said, to board an airplane, to walk in a lot of buildings. why shouldnt we set the bar high when it comes to casting a vote? >> well, because you have to asses...

Statute they cited which is the voter rights act, florida is a state that requires preclearance of changes in voting procedures. its a debatable point whether this is a change in voting procedure. but most lawyers would say because of the potential discriminatory impact it would require preclearance. even the republican election commissioners in florida say they think this is a violation of the law. using department of motor vehicle records to check against the voter polls is a very, very clumsy...

Are undoubtedly correlated with the demographic changes, but this idea of preclearance of the federal government does actually have a say over the former confederate states because of the behavior in the context of the jim crow system. >> exactly, and looping back to the original question, what i would want to say is that one of the fascinating things about dont incumbents want to enforce the laws that would favor them, and i actually feel like it has taken an incredibly long time for the democr...

Of the things that happens is suppression laws is the real fear that america is more and more diverse and people of racial minorities or the national origin minorities tend to vote democratic, and that is forcing the suppression, and i guess i would also add to that just so that we dont lose the direct line between the voting rights act of 1965, and today, you know, that d.o.j. letter that myrna was referencing earlier is a letter from the d.o.j. saying that look, florida has fife counties cover...

Issue, they dispro portionately those that do not have the licenses. >> the attorney general of texas said he alone prosecuted the cases, 50 cases of voter fraud. both sides will say theres not good hard data on either side. theres not data that shows fraud and theres no hard data showing that the laws supress turn out. but the question the attorney general had to answer is, in these states that have to submit their plans, any election changes to the federal government under a process called pre...

Joining me is political analyst and author, earl hutchins. its nice to see you today. as we know from reverend als march and his reporting this week and today being the anniversary, minority voting rights remains a huge issue this campaign season. its also, as i mentioned in the national urban leagues latest report, as we take a peek at this, 31 states require all voters to show i.d. before voting. the report says the justice department now on this case. earl, now that congress hasnt done enough...

>> and they have to go and use all kinds of means to come down and try to acquire it. let me ask you this. we clearly dont see widespread fraud so you and i dont agree on that. why is the state suing the attorney general against section 5 of the voting rights act? what is wrong with that? you dont want to be -- people to be able to vote without special voter i.d. now. dont you understand why people are marching here? theres clearly an anti-voting rights sentiment here. >> i disagree with you com...

Will be the ones that determine that. >> but you are suing because you dont want to go through preclearance on the voting rights act. >> were trying to get it done as quickly as possible. the obama justice department has shown a willingness to drag their feet on issues like this. >> so youre not saying that you dont object to preclearance. you just want it cleared quicker. >> that is correct. >> so you do agree with that. so you disagreed with the attorney general then. >> no, i think that it sh...

Other states and portions of the state meaning it has to get preclearance for changes not electoral maps. in one of the cases you were referencing texas did have a case before the supreme court. the supreme court did not directly decide on the issue of preclearance but seemed like there was a suggestion maybe things have changed enough in the south it is time to revisit that issue. do you think things have improved enough? >> i think things have been improved but i dont think we should get out o...