"Joe the Plumber" Might Not Have Been Able to Vote

Marge Baker | October 20, 2008 - 8:49 am

Tags: voting

Check this out.  The Dayton Daily News reported last week that because Joe "The Plumber" Wurzellbacher's last name is spelled with an "o" not a "u" on the registration rolls, he could have been knocked off the rolls under a policy advocated by the Ohio Republican Party in a suit it had filed in federal court against the Ohio Secretary of State.  The GOP was trying to get the Secretary of State to send to county board of elections "mismatches" - including ones like these -- where the name on the registration is different from the name on DMV or Social Security records. Jennifer Bruner, the Secretary of State, said the action the Ohio GOP was pressing for could have disenfranchised up to 200,000 voters. Fortunately, the Supreme Court stepped in and said that the Republican Party wasn't allowed to bring the suit in federal court; so voters are protected for now.

The GOP has been stirring the pot about ACORN and worried that some election official might let Mickey Mouse vote? Give me a break. Let Joe the Plumber vote, and then let's foucs on the real problem - systematic efforts by the Right to disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of voters