Early vote figures don’t lie. But who figures? (Florida)
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Sunday was a big day to get out the Democratic base — the black vote — as part of a “Souls to the Polls” rally. This was the only day available for after-church weekend voting because the Legislature eliminated early voting on the Sunday before Election Day.
“They’ve cut back the time, but they can’t cut back the line,” said the Rev. Al Sharpton, an MSNBC host and founder of the National Action Network, who stumped in South Florida this weekend.
“The lines are longer,” Sharpton said. “And they may be stronger.”
But the evidence of the longer, stronger lines also conflicts with a talking point from liberals: That the Legislature engaged in “voter suppression” by reducing the number of early-voting days from 14 to eight.
Before 2002, there was no early in-person voting at all. Since then, the Legislature has also expanded chances to cast absentee ballots in Florida. Absentee-ballot voting has gone on for almost a month. It’s easy to request and get one. Almost too easy.
So there’s plenty of time for anyone to cast a ballot (unless you’re a felon, which is a separate issue).
Meantime, conservatives are doing their own share of spinning.
The reduction of early voting hours was made in a package of legislative reforms designed to crack down on voter fraud. But the law didn’t touch absentee-ballot voting, which is the easiest way to commit voter fraud (and it’s not that easy to cast fake ballots, either, especially on a significant scale).
The GOP dominates absentee-ballot voting in Florida. So the GOP Legislature saw little reason to harm their vote-by-mail program. And when The Miami Herald began reporting about fraud issues related to absentee ballots in August, Republicans started complaining that the news media were trying to suppress the GOP vote.
Now that in-person and mail-in ballot voting is underway, there’s a wealth of new data for each side to complain and boast about.
The Democrats are pointing to the big early-vote gains over the weekend as evidence that President Barack Obama has momentum and an unrivaled ground game to turn out voters.
Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/10/28/3071749/early-vote-figures-dont-lie-but.html#storylink=cpy