Senators demand DOJ investigation

Dear Attorney General Gonzales:

We write to request that the Department of Justice promptly investigate allegations that the Republican National Committee engaged in "vote caging" during the 2004 elections. We also ask that you investigate whether any department officials were aware of allegations that Tim Griffin had engaged in caging when he was appointed United States attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas and whether appropriate action was taken. Caging is a reprehensible voter-suppression tactic, and it may also violate federal law and the terms of applicable judicially enforceable consent decrees.

Caging is a voter-suppression tactic whereby a political campaign sends mail marked "do not forward" to a targeted group of eligible voters. A more aggressive version involves sending mail to a targeted group of voters with instructions to sign and return an acknowledgment card. The campaign then creates a list of those whose mail was returned undelivered and challenges the right of those citizens to vote — on the ground that the voter does not live at the registered address. There are many reasons why registered mail might be "returned to sender" that have nothing to do with a voter's eligibility. A voter might be an active member of the armed forces and stationed far from home, or a student registered at his parents' address. Even a typographical error during entry of the voter's registration information might result in an address that appears invalid.

The Republican Party has a long and ignominious record of caging — much of it focused on the African American community. For example, in 1981 the RNC sent a mass mailing into predominantly African American neighborhoods in New Jersey and used the resulting 45,000 letters marked "undeliverable" to challenge those voters' eligibility. In 1986, the RNC used similar tactics in an effort to disenfranchise roughly 31,000 voters, most of them African American, in Louisiana. These tactics led to litigation and the RNC's eventual signing of two consent decrees, still in effect, which bar the RNC from using "ballot security" programs ostensibly intended to prevent voter fraud as a tactic to target minority voters.

In 2004, however, allegations of caging by Republican officials arose again — this time over an effort to suppress votes in Florida. E-mails sent in August 2004 by Tim Griffin, then research director and deputy communications director of the RNC, demonstrate his knowledge and approval of a spreadsheet listing caged voters in predominantly African American neighborhoods in Jacksonville, Florida. Two years later, Mr. Griffin was appointed, without Senate confirmation, as United States attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas. Such actions appear plainly to violate the consent decrees signed by the RNC in 1981 and 1986. We ask that you investigate whether in these circumstances Mr. Griffin or others may also have violated the Voting Rights Act, the National Voter Registration Act, the mail-fraud statute, or any other federal statute.

It also appears that high-ranking officials in the department knew of Mr. Griffin's involvement in caging. Monica Goodling recently testified to the House Judiciary Committee that she discussed concerns about Mr. Griffin's involvement in caging with Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty during a session to prepare for Mr. McNulty's congressional testimony. It is very disturbing to think that department officials may have approved the appointment of a United States attorney knowing that he had engaged in racially targeted vote caging.

Moreover, it is very disturbing to think that senior officials were aware of this practice and did nothing to refer their information to relevant officials within the department for investigation and a determination as to whether it was a violation of a consent decree or law within the department's jurisdiction to enforce.

We, therefore, ask the Office of the Inspector General and the Office of Professional Responsibility to conduct an investigation to determine who in DOJ knew about Mr. Griffin's potentially unlawful activity before he was named interim U.S. attorney, and whether appropriate action was taken on that knowledge, and to recommend whatever action is appropriate.

At a time when the department's political independence and its commitment to enforcement of civil rights statutes have been called into doubt, it is vitally important that the department thoroughly investigate these allegations of unlawful voter suppression and the apparent failure of department employees to forward to the appropriate authorities information they had about this practice.

Sincerely,

— Edward M. Kennedy and Sheldon Whitehouse, United States senators, June 18, 2007

Permanent bases sinister

President Bush is quoted in the Albuquerque Journal (May 31, 2007) as envisioning "a long-term U.S. troop presence in Iraq similar to the one in South Korea, where American forces have helped keep an uneasy peace for more than 50 years." This is a quite misleading and sinister statement.

Bush may claim that permanency of U. S. bases in Iraq is not "necessarily the case . . .," but the facts belie his claim. At least 11 American permanent bases have already been built in Iraq (according to Chalmers Johnson's astutely researched books The Sorrows of Empire and the 2007 Nemesis). Three of these bases are located in and around Baghdad (the Green Zone, Camp Victory North and the al-Rashid Military Camp). Moreover, very elaborate, permanent bases having been established in Kosovo, such as Camp Bondsteel and Camp Monteith.

All these camps cost many billions of dollars to build and more to maintain, money crucially needed here at home for Americans having their jobs displaced overseas, for the public losses of enormous tax monies going to the rich, for the homeless, for seniors living mainly on Social Security income, for rundown schools and disintegrating cities, and for rehabilitating easily the worst national health system among all G-8 nations.

Washington wants permanent control — thus these permanent bases — where its corporate and energy interests are located. If our country has troops in 130 nations and at least 737 (Chalmers Johnson suggests 1,000) bases in nations globally, this is not to spread democracy; it is to establish a permanent intimidating military presence against any movement or activity that would destabilize American commercial domination around the world. This imperialist militant vigilance certainly applies to Iraq and the Middle East.

As for Washington keeping an "uneasy peace" in Korea for 50 years, South Koreans have been quoted as claiming recently that the nation they most fear is not North Korea but the United States.

— Donald K. Gutierrez, Albuquerque