I just got suppressed. In Travis county (Austin, TX) by flvorful

[kpete]

I just got suppressed
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by flvorful
Sat Oct 09, 2010 at 09:03:05 AM PDT

I just got suppressed. In Travis county (Austin, TX).

This sux.

UPDATE: Since it's not clear to some people, I was registered to vote and now I am not.

The funny part of the whole ordeal is that I feel like I wasnt actually a target, just an innocent bystander that the Republicans didnt quite think about. Granted, Im a progressive and a minority, but I make good money and am usually kept out of the firing lines of the Repubs, but this time I dont think they thought all the way through this tactic (sure, they dont think through most of their tactics, but this could bite them in the ass).

You see, I am part of the new younger generation that grew up with computers and I rarely ever check my regular snail mail. The only reason I checked it today was to get my allergy medication. Awaiting me with my medicine was a nice letter from Nelda Wells Spears (Travis County Tax Assessor-Collector) that stated that I have been put in Suspended status because "2 consecutive mailings have neen returned to our office..". The best part was this line: "The registration deadline date for the November 2, 2010 election is Monday, October 4th", today is Oct 9. Wonderful, now I cant vote. I dont know how many of you have lived in an apt, but if you have ever received any registered mail to it you know that the Post Office wont deliver it to your door (at least not here in Austin) and they wont leave it at the Apartment Office, so you are forced to drive down to the Post Office to pick it up. If you are like me and work constantly, you usually dont have time to do this. This leads me to the backfiring part of the tactic. I happen to be a progressive, but my apt is in Mccaul's district and I am quite sure I am not the only out here trying to be fully paperless, so what I am wondering is, how many Republicans just got their records purged also?

Most of my friends rarely check their mail because they are also trying to be paperless and since most new housing developments have community mailboxes, it's even more difficult to check the mail on a regular basis and missing some of this voter reg paperwork is quite easy.

I am pissed that I cant vote, but if this tactic ends up suppressing Republican turnout along with our turnout then that would be some karmic justice and I would be quite happy with it.

How many of you have been suppressed recently?

--jake
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2010/10/9/909006/-I-just-got-suppressed

[Ozymanithrax]

1. Actually, it is well thought out.

They don't care about the elecitons 2 years from now, only this one. They will worry about supressing the vote the next time, using this and othe tried and true methods.

They know that every person on the other side they can take off the list of voters, the easier they win at the ballot box will come.

There is a saying abouit "eternal vigalence..."

[TexasObserver]

2. Correct. Registration laws are a scheme to limit Democratic voters.

These laws are used to send out notices and if no response is given are designed to cull from the voting rolls voters in areas the GOP doesn't want voting. Apartment dwellers are high on that list. Anyone who is mobile - which tends to be persons on the lower half of the economic continuum - is adversely affected. The system favors those who own their homes and live there a long time. Those voters tend to vote GOP more than Democratic, as a group and generally speaking.

It's an obscene perversion of our right to vote, and it is designed to limit voting by people who might vote Democratic. There should be no registration for voting. If you show up with a valid driver's license on election day, you should always be able to vote in the box for that address.

[hobbit709]

3. That's why you should check your mail.

Not everything in the world is handled by IM or texting.

And it's not like the community mailboxes in apartments are 5 miles away from your apartment.

[Dr.Phool]

4. Obviously.

I still want all of my bills on paper, instead of "going paperless", just in case the technology fails, as in my computer crashes.

[Gaedel]

5. It may not be nefarious

One of the headaches of the registrar's life is newspaper stories that say "25,000 dead people in Schmidlap County are still registered to vote".

As a result, most conscientious registrars try to keep the rolls purged of people that have died, have moved out of the precinct, or have become felons. The main vehicle for this is a registered letter. My Democratic county registrar pings me every couple of years.

[Overseas]

6. K&R! //nt

[stray cat]

7. It pays to open letters and use legitimate addresses

bills get lost that way to

[northoftheborder]

8. I don't see a conspiracy in this situation....

I also live in Travis County, and know that the Registrar is a long time Democrat. They have to have some method of culling out people who have moved away or into another district or have died. I can see how this would be slightly more difficult to get mail for apartment dwellers, but the individuals have to take some responsibility for reregistering. Just because you are trying to go paperless is not an excuse for not checking your regular mailbox regularly. Sorry to be a scold, but I just don't think this is a case of "suppression".

I'm very discouraged by the inability to get a strong candidate to run against McCaul. Apparently the person running has no money, and he must not be getting any from the State Party, because I have seen no ads or mailouts. I can't even think of his name at the moment, but he seems to be an impressive and intelligent person. McCaul just skates by on his wife's wealth and is never challenged.

[ananda]

9. I live in McCaul's district, too. That so sucks.

But I can still vote. I wish I could vote for you too.

[The Philosopher]

10. If Suspended is what I think it is

You can still vote. When you come in to your polling place and the clerk looks you up on the list there will be an (S) next to the name. We're told that the person can vote, but they MUST fill out a card with their correct addresses.

Now, regardless of the example above, if you come in (and this is for the state of Texas) and the clerks and Judges tell you that you CAN'T VOTE, that is illegal. I've Clerked/Judged for years. We are not allowed to tell you that you can't vote. We can tell you that we're not your right polling station; we can tell you that you aren't registered to vote. But if you want to vote we can't stop you.

What a voter will do is vote provisionally. You vote by ballot and then you put your ballot in a secret envelope, which is encased in a bigger envelope with required information. You will put your name, your address, maybe your social security number, and some other things. The election judge will put down the reason for the provisional ballot. Your provisional vote will then be looked at by the voter's administration office (by panel, I believe) to determine if your vote can be counted valid or invalid. Many scoff at provisional votes, claiming that the administration office never even look at them but throw them away. But I think that's more paranoia than not. If anything, get records. We wear name tags so you know who we are. Write our names down, the location, and get the number for the county's administration office. We close at 7pm across the state and usually get the votes to the county seat within an hour, depending on the distance and skill of the judges/clerks. You can start calling around 8pm and inquiring about your provisional vote. I don't know what you can do if you're told your vote was invalid. But I'm sure you can do something (I just don't know what).

But, if anything, call before you head out to vote. Call the administration office and ask them if you're able to vote. You're on a database with the same info the polling place will have, except they'll know the reason WHY you're not eligible. Always ask ahead of time. Sometimes things screw up. If you register to vote, call before the registration deadline is up and ask if you're officially registered. That way if something wrong went down, you can get it cleared up in time.

Just remember, if you walk into the polling place, you can never, ever be refused your right to vote.

[Melissa G]

11. IMHO, a slightly modified version of your response would be worth an Op that I

would be happy to rec. Please PM me a link if you decide to post. This is good info that more folks should have.

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

12. Ummmmmmm

it seems to me this is as much as result of what you did as anything else. I hope you'll be more diligent about these things in the future. So I guess, no I don't see this as the fault of the system. Not having time to go the the Post Office seems a bit of a reach eh? :)

[tammywammy]

13. This is why you should check your mail

When I lived in apartment, I just drove by the mail center a couple/three times a week on either my way out or in. It's not that difficult to check your mail.

[readmoreoften]

17. Naughty, naughty!

Thanks for scolding!

[EC]

14. Sound like caging...

Did they even bother to put an apartment # on it? They know the mail isn't delivered unless apt.# is included...they tried that here in WI and got called on it...it's being investigated now...

[hobbit709]

21. I doubt it was caging

After all, we're known as the "People's Republic of Austin" by the pukes.

[krispos42]

15. Busy employed people get booted, angry unemployed people aren't

Maybe they're not as thoughtless as we'd like them to be. :-(

[Ichingcarpenter]

16. This story comes home to me

My son was born in Austin and I was a

ACORN president for my little area I lived in at that time.
Austin is not what it used to be.... my brother still lives there
as he has, when he was county judge.

Austin is still a liberal oasis in Texas
but the water has become more tainted. over time
and the oasis will be refreshed my electing democrats

Voting suppression , judicial corruption and police brutality
got me a federal job in Houston. right after college...

Johnson was no Saint..... but that's Texas politics as usual


I know people this guy could talk to in Austin to bring it to attention.
if someone PMs me.

[Jane Austin]

18. I got suspended last year because our mail box was vandaized

and we didn't put up another one.

We were able to vote - the District Clerk straightened it out for us.

We're in Bastrop County.

[SoCalDem]

19. register as a republican

if you live in a decidedly "red" area. They will move heaven & earth to see that you stay registered.

You can probably update your registration status online in order to vote in your primaries..switch to dem in the nick of time & then switch back so by the time the 2 yr cycle comes around, you have an R next to your name.

[tammywammy]

22. You don't register dem/rep in Texas.

We have open primaries.

[SoCalDem]

23. well.. back to the drawing board

I guess an occasional trip to the registrar's office to check your status might be in order:)

[WolverineDG]

20. So now it's the government's responsibility to make sure you pick up your mail?

:eyes:

Wonder what the postmark on the love letter from the voter registration office was. Doesn't matter if he didn't pick up his mail until 10/9. If it's been sitting in his mail box for a couple of weeks, seems to me it was mailed in time.

Of course, he could always cast a provisional ballot, but since that can't be done via IM or email, he might not know how to do it.....

dg