Using the Census for Voting Fraud
Thursday, April 30th, 2009In 2010, the national census will be re-conducted. One of the principal uses of the census is to determine the number of Representatives and Senators a state will be permitted to send to Washington. At the state level, census numbers are used to create voting districts for state elections. How a district is zoned can create an advantage to either the Republican or the Democratic party. Each zone has a potentially enormous impact on the final results of an election.
Florida has approximately 100,000 state prisoners, a large number of Federal Prisoners, and an enormous number of disenfranchised citizens who have lost their right to vote due to a previous felony conviction. When is comes to using population numbers to zone, or rezone voting districts for state elections, prisoners and disenfranchised voters should not be counted as part of the population. To recognize them for a privilege they are denied manipulates an equally unfair advantage to politicians, usually favoring the Republican party. Traditionally, most prisoners, (particularly the disproportionately high amount of incarcerated minorities) would vote for the Democratic Party in State and Federal elections.
If one examines the placement of state prison facilities in Florida, it is apparent that most are situated in backwoods rural counties. Chipley Florida? Perry Florida? These areas look like they are straight out of the movie “Deliverance”. The residents certainly act like it! And it is these people who are given a frightening ability to influence elections at a state level, due to counting 1500-2000 extra incarcerated “residents” who are potentially able to skew poll results on a state wide level in a rezoned district.
Moreover, the overall majority in incarceree’s housed in facilities in North Florida, and the states panhandle, are from families that reside in Central and South Florida. It is the Department of Corrections deliberate and sadistic malice to place prisoners as far from their homes and families as possible, in order to create the most substantial hardship for both prisoners and their loved ones. This seemingly unrelated practice also impacts the census, which affects how voting districts are zoned across the state.
During the forthcoming census, politicians will be able to influence and tamper with the census by shifting around upwards to one hundred-thousand state prisoners to create the most beneficial populous numbers, creating opportunities to rezone voting districts with the intent to influence upcoming elections.
Two key questions of concern emerge here. First, should politicians be permitted to manipulate how voting districts are zoned by weighting districts with prisoners, as well as disenfranchised citizens?
Second, does this practice constitute fraud, since it unfairly impacts the votes of lawfully entitled citizens? Isn’t it essentially cheating these voters through skewing poll results to favor politicians?
Given Florida’s infamy for a history of voting and elections fraud, I would think that any hints of similar indecency would be the worst of news. This situation deserves being investigated.
Michael Anthony Wachter