WALB-TV, Albany. South Georgia’s #1 News Source: Challenge dropped against most Atkinson voters
Many of the people who gathered outside the Atkinson County Courthouse had at least one thing in common, a Hispanic name.
They all received letters saying their right to vote had been challenged.
“I didn’t know why I was being challenged,” said Antonio Hernandez, who’s lived in the county for 12 years and served on a grand jury there. “I didn’t know what was the cause or anything.”
So they filled the courtroom, many prepared to show birth certificates and citizenship papers, all because three men, Frank Sutton, Phillip Liles and James Mullis, questioned their right to vote.
“It was a closely contested commissioners race,” Liles said. “And after looking into it, it had been discovered that there were some non-citizens who had been asked to vote.”
But after county attorney Russ Gillis began the hearing, it didn’t take him long to get to his point. The challenges were dismissed because they were “legally insufficient because they’re based soley on race,” he said to the courtroom.
Representing the Board of Registrars, he explained that the 96 people who received letters represent nearly 80 percent of the county’s Hispanic voter, making it obvious they were challenged only because of their race, which is a violation of the Voters Rights Act.
But before it was over, one citizen wanted to make a point of her own.
“If you went to school and studied history, you should know that even your last name is foreign,” said Olga Martinez, who was raised in a migrant farming family and became a U.S. citizen four years ago.
In fact, many of the people challenged were born U.S. citizens and pointed out that they are never challenged when they come to pay taxes.
“They kind of just take your check and I was kind of surprised to be challenged to vote,” said Sid Rodriguez, who was born and raised in Texas and has lived in Atkinson County for more than 20 years.
ith little notice or discussion, Senator Christopher Bond of Missouri allowed a provision into a Senate appropriations bill that could ban even nonpartisan voter registration efforts in public housing developments all over the country. This is an example of the unfortunate impulse now afflicting some parts of the Republican Party: a desire to suppress voting in poor and minority neighborhoods. Mr. Bond’s proposal runs contrary to both the spirit of democracy and federal law, which in recent years has moved increasingly toward broadening ballot access. The National Voter Registration Act – commonly known as the Motor Voter Act – actually requires state agencies, including those that issue welfare benefits and drivers’ licenses, to offer voter registration materials to the people they serve.
The proposed Senate legislation comes on top of recent G.O.P. maneuvers in Ohio, where Republicans challenged the registrations of more than 30,000 voters, many of them impoverished. Federal courts have stepped in to halt such challenges for now, but more are expected at the polls.
The same impulse to discourage voters was on display over the last several months in New Mexico, where the Indian Health Service of the Health and Human Services Department suspended voter registration efforts for several months at some medical centers and clinics serving Native Americans. Earlier this month, the Indian Health Service issued a memorandum effectively ending the ban, but only after untold numbers of Native Americans had missed the opportunity to register to vote in the coming election.
Mr. Bond’s argument – that housing built with public money should be used only for housing, not voter registration – makes no sense on its face. It is even more ridiculous given the universal support for voter registration on military bases around the world. Military voters tend to favor Republicans, and public housing residents tend to favor Democrats. It would be nice if everyone could agree that both groups should be encouraged to vote.