People For the American Way Foundation

Virginia Board of Elections Calls the Right’s Bluff

The Right’s nationwide attack on voting rights suffered a setback in Virginia when the Board of Elections refused to investigate a string of charges made by the Romney Campaign regarding prepopulated voter registration forms.

Page Gardner, Voter Participation Center, President:

We applaud the fact that the Virginia Board of Elections has decided to reject all three of the Romney Campaign’s demands and reaffirmed its commitment to increasing the number of registered voters in Virginia.

Marvin Randolph, NAACP, Sr. Vice President for Campaigns:

More than 15,000 applications would have been at stake if this complaint were allowed to move forward. We applaud the Board of Elections for acting responsibly and denying this effort to block thousands of eligible voters from the ballot box.

The Romney camp alleged that the Voter Participation Center engaged in criminal activity by attempting to register ineligible voters, but the BOE, while noting data problems, agreed that the VPC intended only to register as many qualified citizens as possible. Even so, if there were a problem, shouldn’t Virginia’s so-called fraud-fighting voter ID law have prevented this?

Here are some furry friends to set the record straight:

Click here and here for more from Progress Virginia and here for more from the Advancement Project.

Tags:

112th Congress, Advancement Project, Marvin Randolph, Mitt Romney, NAACP, Page Gardner, Policy Corner, Progress Now, Progress Virginia, public policy, voter ID, Voter Participation Center, Voter Registration, voter suppression, voting rights, VPC