Posted on 09/09/2006 4:48:15 AM PDT by Libloather
McKinney hints at challenging Georgia voting laws
Lawmaker says 'malicious crossover' voting by Republicans disenfranchised black voters in her district
By Ben Evans
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Posted on Fri, Sep. 08, 2006
WASHINGTON - Outgoing Georgia Rep. Cynthia McKinney hinted Thursday that she or her supporters might try again to challenge the legality of state voting laws that allowed Republicans to vote in the Democratic primary where she lost her House seat last month.
McKinney, the first black woman elected to Congress from Georgia, said "malicious crossover" voting by Republicans disenfranchised black voters in her district from picking their candidate of choice, despite the fact that the winner of the primary is also black.
She said the state's primary system violates the Voting Rights Act, which was first passed in 1965 to protect minority voters. "In the state of Georgia, we have some unfinished business with respect to the Voting Rights Act," McKinney said after a panel session on U.S. intelligence programs she hosted at the annual conference of the Congressional Black Caucus. "We have got to do subsequent lawsuits to deal with these statutes."
McKinney's supporters made similar arguments in a 2002 lawsuit after McKinney lost her seat to Denise Majette. A U.S. District Court judge dismissed the suit, and the decision was upheld by the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
McKinney, who won the seat back in 2004 after Majette gave it up to run for Senate, would not say Thursday whether she is planning another lawsuit. She said the question might be better posed to her constituents and that she is not ready to announce a next step.
Unlike some other states, Georgia allows voters to pick which primary they want to vote in, regardless of their party status.
"What happened to me ... is that an incredible number of Republicans decided they would pick up Democratic ballots," she said. "I guess you could say I'm the poster child for Republican crossover." McKinney, a firebrand known for her confrontational style and a scuffle with a Capitol Hill police officer earlier this year, was forced into a runoff in the July Democratic primary by challenger Hank Johnson, an attorney and former DeKalb County commissioner. Johnson, who also is black, went on to defeat McKinney 59 percent to 41 percent in the Democratic runoff.
Voting results show that Johnson fared well in heavily Democratic areas of the district that had been McKinney's base of support, such as south DeKalb County, where Johnson won 57 percent of the vote in the primary runoff.
McKinney, who declined to discuss her political future, also charged that the state's system for runoff elections, in which winners must take more than half the vote to avoid a runoff, violates the law.
Shortly after the election, McKinney blamed her loss on the media and on electronic voting machines, which she says are a threat to the nation's democracy.
She hosted a forum on alleged civil rights abuses by law enforcement and intelligence agencies, comparing them to well-documented efforts to silence black activists in the 1960s. Panelists blasted the Bush administration for creating what they said was a police state in which fundamental constitutional rights are consistently violated.
"We know where the wickedness is in Washington, D.C. It's at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue," McKinney said.
It's over for the thug McKinney...these last gasping breaths are pathetic.
She fought the law and the law won!
She fought the law and the law won!
She needed votes cause she had none,
She fought the law and the law won!
Beating reporters with a big thug,
She fought the law and the law won!
I lost the election and I feel so sad
but I think this race aint done,
I'm gonna pimp a few more votes,
She fought the law and the law won!
Didn't complain when it was a Dem tactic. But now it hurts when Repubs do it, huh Cindy?
(Chuckle)
I wonder how she'll like it when conservatives do themselves one better, and decide that a good way to deal with radical leftwing moonbats is to simply challenge them in Democratic primaries.
I think she wants a law where only her voters can vote. For her, whoever doesn't plan to vote for her should be called 'crossover voters'.
Poor Cindy. Just another racist loser who can't deal with being rejected by the voters. Congress will be a better place once she is gone. Getting rid of McKinney is a good start towards cleaning that dump up. The Capitol Hill police are smiling.
She is just pathetic.
Black people have a God Given right to be able to vote without Republicans voting contrarily?
Click the pic...
That is a very good idea.
What a dummy.
LOL! I have a feeling that 'malicious crossover' voting by Republicans may spread to the state of Connecticut. :)
Oh my alert the media - oh by the way the Democrats and gays have been doing this for years -
I miss the old Looney Toons on saturday morning...but this helps make up for it!
As usual, its up to the Republicans to save the Democrats from themselves.
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