Constitutional Law

Community Organizing Group Said To Be Under FBI Scrutiny

The nonprofit organization that helps register low-income people to vote is apparently being investigated by the FBI over allegations that it has improperly registered voters, Josh Marhall at Talking Points Memo reports. According to TPM, the FBI is investigating whether ACORN “helped foster voter registration fraud around the nation before the presidential election.” Marshall writes that politicians have been “aggressively lobbying” the Department of Justice to investigate ACORN and that leaking word of the FBI investigation “most likely violates DOJ guidelines about DOJ/FBI actions which can end up interfering with or manipulating an election.”

Politicians and their supporters frequently complain, especially during presidential elections, about “vote fraud.” Election experts, however, argue that vote fraud is extremely rare and is often a tactic used to limit the ability of citizens to vote. During a recent panel discussion hosted by ACS and the American University Washington College of Law, several voting rights specialists challenged the notion that widespread vote fraud exists. Video of that panel discussion is here.

Full post as published by ACS Blog on October 16, 2008 (boomark / email).