{news} GP RELEASE Greens challenge Electoral College manipulation of pres. election outcome

Tue Aug 5 16:11:27 EDT 2008

----- Original Message -----

From: "Scott McLarty"
To: natlcomaffairs at green.gpus.org
Subject: [usgp-dx] GP RELEASE Greens challenge Electoral College
manipulation of pres. election outcome
Date: Tue, 5 Aug 2008 17:37:34 +0000

GREEN PARTY OF THE UNITED STATES
http://www.gp.org

For Immediate Release:
Tuesday, August 5, 2008

Contacts:
Scott McLarty, Media Coordinator, 202-518-5624, cell 202-904-7614,
mclarty at greens.org
Starlene Rankin, Media Coordinator, 916-995-3805, starlene at gp.org

Greens launch effort against Electoral College manipulation of
presidential elections

• Malapportionment of Electoral College votes may lead to a
Republican victory despite the popular vote, disenfranchising tens
of thousands of voters, especially black voters in southern states

• Green civil action seeks to democratize the Electoral College by
enforcing 14th Amendment voter protections, names Vice President
Cheney as defendent

WASHINGTON, DC -- Green Party leaders said today that the outcome
of the 2008 presidential election may be affected by the
antidemocratic apportionment of Electoral College votes, with the
popular vote misrepresented by the winner-take-all system of
assigning votes to electors.

"We're in danger of seeing the 2008 election stolen again, as in
2000 and 2004," said Clyde Shabazz, Green candidate for the US
House in Michigan (13th District) (http://www.migreens.org). "In
Florida in 2000 and Ohio in 2004, we witnessed the obstruction and
manipulation of votes by election officials and possible tampering
with computer voting machines. But equally insidious is the
malapportionment of Electoral College votes, which disenfranchises
whole sections of the voting public."

A civil action to protect the voting rights of presidential
electors and the voters they represent was filed in the US District
Court for the District of Columbia (1:08-cv-01294) on January 28,
2008, by Asa Gordon, chair of the DC Statehood Green Party's
Electoral College Task Force and executive director of the Douglass
Institute of Government (http://members.aol.com/digasa/dig.htm).

The action seeks relief against the defendant, Vice President
Cheney, who will preside over the tabulation of "unbound electoral
states" on January 6, 2009, challenging the recognition of
Electoral College votes that are apportioned by states on a
winner-take-all basis.

The civil action seeks enforcement of the 'Mal-Apportionment
Penalty' provided in Section 2 of the 14th Amendment to the US
Constitution, which mandates a reduction of a state's presidential
electors and congressional representatives if "the right to vote at
any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice
President of the United States... is denied... or in any way
abridged."

The civil action alternatively seeks the issuance of a court order
providing proportional apportionment of presidential electors.

"If two thirds of the voters in a state vote for a candidate from
Party A and one third vote for a candidate from Party B, and the
state's winner-take-all rule gives all of the state's electors to
Party A, then one third of the voters have been disenfranchised in
violation of Amendment 14, Section 2 of the US Constitution," said
Jody Grage, treasurer of the Green Party. "We've witnessed in
election after election how some states have used the
winner-take-all formula to prevent the votes of political, ethnic,
and other minorities from being counted."

Mr. Gordon noted that the civil action had the potential to "alter
the fate of the 2008 presidential election in a manner different
from any presidential election in the nation's history."
(http://www.electors.us)

"By refusing to challenge Electoral College malapportionment in
2000 and 2004, which blocked Democratic electors from voting in
those elections, the Democratic Party's leaders abandoned tens of
thousands of their own voters, just as they failed to challenge the
election irregularities in Florida and Ohio in 2000 and 2004," said
Mr. Gordon. "Will they fail to challenge malapportionment again in
2008, and hand the Republicans another victory? Barack Obama would
not be the Democratic nominee if not for the Democratic Party's
proportional assignment of primary delegates. The winner-take-all
provisions in the general election present the distinct possibility
that Mr. Obama in 2008 will win the popular vote by a considerably
larger margin than did Gore in 2000, but will repeat the Democratic
loss in the Electoral College."

Mr. Gordon said that African American voters in several southern
states* that were represented by proportional assignment of
delegates in the Democratic primary, and who were critical to
Barack Obama's success, will be lost to Mr. Obama under the
winner-take-all rules of the general election.

"If proportional assignment is considered by Democrats to be vital
to democracy in their primary elections, why won't they fight for
it in the general election?" asked Mr. Gordon, who led workshops
for Green presidential electors during the 2008 Green National
Convention (http://www.gp.org/speakers/detail.php?ID=29)
(http://www.greenparty2008.org/wiki/index.php/Workshops).

As a result of the workshops, several Green electors pledged to
presidential candidate (and eventual Green nominee) Cynthia
McKinney agreed to institute a program for enforcement of the
Reconstruction-Era provision enshrined in the 14th Amendment.

"The 'Democratize the Electoral College' program exposes the
hypocrisy and fraud behind charges that the McKinney campaign might
'spoil' the Democratic presidential ticket's chances of winning.
Democratic leaders should have to explain why they choose to ignore
13 additional electors from southern states that they'd gain
through the Green Party's presidential electors project. Why is
the Green Party fighting to give voice to Democratic voters that
the Democratic Party will not fight for? Let me be clear -- we're
not doing this to assist Barack Obama, but to foster real democracy
and voter participation, and to offer Cynthia McKinney as the truly
democratic choice for all the people," said Mr. Gordon.

Green Party leaders noted that after John Kerry quickly conceded
the 2004 election, Democratic leaders failed to respond to
thousands of complaints about voting irregularities in Ohio and
other states. Green presidential nominee David Cobb and
Libertarian nominee Michael Badnarik launched the Ohio and New
Mexico recount efforts and collected the initial evidence that
Republican officials had blocked the votes of many African American
and young voters (http://www.iwantmyvote.com). Greens raised most
of the money for the recounts. Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) later
held hearings and published evidence of the election theft
(http://www.freepress.org/departments/display/19/2005/1101).

Cynthia McKinney and running mate Rosa Clemente were nominated
during the 2008 Green National Convention in Chicago, July 10-13.

The Green Party's national platform endorses a constitutional
amendment abolishing the Electoral College and providing for the
direct election of the president by instant runoff voting
(http://www.gp.org/platform/2004/democracy.html#309649).

"Americans don't vote for President. Instead, we vote for an
electoral college which was created in the late 1700s to expressly
increase the power of the slave states -- and which it is still
doing," said Mark Dunlea, an election law attorney with the Green
Party of New York State.

* Asa Gordon's civil action observes that the Office of the Federal
Register of the National Archives and Records Administration
explicitly declares that "the electors in these (Southern) States
(ARKANSAS -- 6 Electoral Votes, GEORGIA -- 15 Electoral Votes,
LOUISIANA -- 9 Electoral Votes, TENNESSEE -- 11 Electoral Votes,
TEXAS -- 34 Electoral Votes) are not bound by State Law to cast
their vote for a specific candidate"
(http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/electoral-college/laws.html).

The civil action was filed on July 28, 2008, to commemorate the
140th anniversary of the adoption of the 14th Amendment to the US
Constitution. Since the debacle of the 2000 presidential election,
the Green Party in partnership with the Douglass Institute of
Government has led the way in educating Americans about their
constitutional "right to vote" under the provisions of 14th
Amendment, Section 2.

MORE INFORMATION

Green Party of the United States http://www.gp.org
202-319-7191, 866-41GREEN
Fax 202-319-7193
• Green candidate database for 2008 and other campaign information:
http://www.gp.org/elections.shtml
• Green Party News Center http://www.gp.org/newscenter.shtml
• Green Party Speakers Bureau http://www.gp.org/speakers
• Green Party ballot access page http://www.gp.org/2008-elections

Cynthia McKinney/Rosa Clemente 'Power to the People' Campaign for
the White House http://www.runcynthiarun.org

Mal-Apportionment Penalty Civil Actions http://www.electors.us

"Greens: Enforce 14th Amendment's 'Right to Vote' Provision"
Green Party press release, October 18, 2004
http://www.gp.org/press/pr_10_18_04.html

"Greens Push for Real Electoral Reforms at Carter-Baker Hearings, June
30"
Green Party press release, June 27, 2005
http://www.gp.org/press/pr_2005_06_27.shtml

2008 Green National Convention, July 10-13 in Chicago, Illinois
http://www.greenparty2008.org

~ END ~

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******************************************
Tim McKee, Manchester CT, main number cell-860-778-1304, 860-643-2282
 National Commitee member of the Green Party of the United States and is a spokesperson for the Green Party of CT.
BLOG-http://thebiggreenpicture.blogspot.com

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