UMD Libertarians

Utah’s congressional delegation is calling President Obama’s decision to move the U.S. census into the White House a purely partisan move and potentially dangerous to congressional redistricting around the country.
Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, told FOX News on Monday that he finds it hard to believe the Obama administration felt the need to place re-evaluation of the inner workings of the census so high on his to-do list, just three weeks into his presidency.

"This is nothing more than a political land grab," Chaffetz said.
Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, told the Salt Lake Tribune that the move "shouldn’t happen." He and Chaffetz are trying to rally Republicans "before its too late."
"It takes something that is supposedly apolitical like the census, and gives it to a guy who is infamously political," Bishop said of Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, who would be tasked with overseeing the census at the White House.
The U.S. census — a counting of the U.S. population — is conducted every 10 years by the Commerce Department. Its results determine the decennial redrawing of congressional districts
As a matter of impact, the census has tremendous political significance. Political parties are always eager to have a hand in redrawing districts so that they can maximize their own party’s clout while minimizing the opposition, often through gerrymandering.
The census also determines the composition of the Electoral College, which chooses the president. If one party were to control the census, it could arguably try to perpetuate its hold on political power.
The results of the census are also enormously important in another way — the allocation of federal funds. Theoretically, a political party could disproportionately steer federal funding to areas dominated by its own members through a skewing of census numbers.
At this point the White House doesn’t seem willing to say what Emanuel’s role will be in overseeing the census, and White House officials say census managers will work closely with top-level White House staffers, but will technically remain part of the Commerce Department.
But critics say the White House chief of staff can’t be expected to handle the census in a neutral manner. Emanuel ran the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in the 2006 election, and he was instrumental in getting Democrats elected into the majority.
"The last thing the census needs is for any hard-bitten partisan (either a Karl Rove or a Rahm Emanuel) to manipulate these critical numbers. Many federal funding formulas depend on them, as well as the whole fabric of federal and state representation. Partisans have a natural impulse to tilt the playing field in their favor, and this has to be resisted," Larry Sabato, the director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, told FOX News in an e-mail.
Critics note that the method of counting can skew the census. Democrats have long advocated using mathematical estimates, a practice known as "sampling," to count urban residents and immigrants. Republicans say the Constitution requires a physical head count, which entails going door-to-door.
In 2000, Utah, which has three congressmen, was extremely close to landing a fourth House seat based on U.S. Census numbers, but the nation’s most conservative state fell short by a few hundred votes because the Census Bureau wouldn’t count Mormon missionaries from Utah serving temporarily overseas.
The GOP took the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, but was ultimately unsuccessful. Utah leaders had hoped the 2010 census would rectify the problem, but now worry that they will lose again if the census is managed by partisans.
When Obama nominated New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson to be commerce secretary — he was later forced to withdraw — he indicated that Richardson would be in charge of the census.
The decision to move the census into the White House was announced just days after Obama named New Hampshire Sen. Judd Gregg, a Republican, to be his commerce secretary. Gregg has long opposed "sampling" by the census and has voted against funding increases for the bureau.
Sabato said moving the census "in-house" will likely set up a situation where neither the Commerce Department nor the White House will know exactly what is going on in the Census Bureau. He said the process is "too critical to politics for both parties not to pay close attention."
"I’ve always remembered what Joseph Stalin said: ‘Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything.’ The same principle applies to the census. Since one or the other party will always be in power at the time of the census, it is vital that the out-of-power party at least be able to observe the process to make sure it isn’t being stacked in favor of the party in power. This will be difficult for the GOP since I suspect Democrats will control both houses of Congress for the entire Obama first term," Sabato said.

A Guide to the Political Left

• Largest radical group in America, with more than 400,000 dues-paying member families, and more than 1,200 chapters in 110 U.S. cities

The “Shadow Party” is a term originally devised by journalists to describe 527 political committees promoting Democratic Party agendas. It is here used more specifically to refer to the network of non-profit activist groups organized by and others to mobilize resources – money, get-out-the-vote drives, campaign advertising and policy iniatives – to elect Democratic candidates and guide the Democratic Party towards the left.

"It takes something that is supposedly apolitical like the census, and gives it to a guy who is infamously political," Bishop said of Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, who would be tasked with overseeing the census at the White House.

LAS VEGAS — Nevada authorities seized records Tuesday from a group they accused of submitting fraudulent voter-registration forms — including for the starting lineup of the Dallas Cowboys.
"Tony Romo is not registered to vote in the state of Nevada, and anybody trying to pose as Terrell Owens won’t be able to cast a ballot on Nov. 4," said Secretary of State Ross Miller, referring to star players on the pro football team.
State authorities raided the headquarters of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, a group that works to register low-income people.

Cleveland, Ohio: ACORN told the Cleveland Plain Dealer that it could not eliminate fraud from its operation. The Cuyahoga County Election Board started investigating the 65,000 voter registration cards this past August. They flagged fifty voter registration cards for having the same names on them. Election officials also state that they cannot verify all the voter registration cards before the election.
ACORN has also been brought under scrutiny because they were taking Cuyahoga County residents to register to and to on the same day. Election officials are not able to verify the validity of these new registrants therefore opening the door to possibly additional fraud.

Cleveland has more problems than just ACORN. According the Post, the pro-Obama group called Vote Today was at soup kitchens and homeless shelters picking up people to register to and to on the same day. They reported that the group picked up 59 year old William Woods at the Bishop Cosgrove Center, which is a local soup kitchen. Mr. Woods claimed that he never voted before because he was convicted of a felony. He added that without this service he would have had no way to vote

Connecticut: In April, journalism students from the University of Connecticut discovered that 8,500 deceased Connecticut residents were still registered to vote. The Hartford Courant reports that about 300 of them have indeed voted.
Connecticut’s Secretary of State, Susan Bysiewicz, told the Hartford Courant, ""While we want to remove dead people from the rolls, we don’t want to be overzealous and disenfranchise people." She also said that the investigation into the deceased registered voters will not be completed by day on November 4th.

Nevada: Agents from the Nevada Secretary of State and Attorney Gerneral’s office raided ACORN’s Clark County office. The agents were looking for 59 felons that were hired by ACORN and apparently submitted nearly 300 fraudulent voter registration cards. Some of the fraudulent cards included the names of the Dallas Cowboy’s football team.

A former employee of ACORN admitted to making up fraudulent cards when the summer heat in made it too hot to work outside. ACORN expects its employees to complete twenty voter registration forms per shift or the employee risks probation or termination.

The agents removed twenty boxes of documents and eight computer hard drives from the ACORN office. In response to the raid the southwest regional director of ACORN, Matthew Henderson, stated, "The raid was a stunt designed perhaps to make them look tough on voter fraud. We don’t think fraud is a rampant problem." He then added, "This was a politically motivated stunt, that is all there is to it because those new voters can reshape the electorate of Nevada." Both the Attorney General and the Secretary of State in Nevada are democrats.

Washington: The state of Washington’s voter registration fraud started in 2006. Apparently, ACORN submitted over 1,800 voter registration forms. Only six out of the 1,800 were authentic. ACORN workers told state investigators how they made up names, addresses, and social security numbers.

Five ACORN workers plead guilty and served jail time for the forgeries. Despite this the head of ACORN’s Washington office, John Jones, insists that "It was a difficult time but you know what, that was the exception and not the rule. The exception was that something did not go right" Jones denied that the organization was responsible.

This is the reason that King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg wants voters to show a photo I. D. when going to the polls. The Washington state legislature sided with ACORN and turned down the idea.