Politics or Justice?

Accusations that the Voting Section of the Department of Justice is poisoned by politics are not new and neither are its loudest critics.

In the fall of 2007, those declaring that the George W. Bush Administration used the Voting Section to achieve a political purpose got their day in “court.” On October 30, 2007, former Voting Section Chief John Tanner testified to the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties. He was called to testify following his decision to pre-clear a law in Georgia requiring that voters present photo identification at the polls.[1] He stated that he made this decision solely based on the facts of the case and the applicable law. However, in doing so, he effectively overruled the objections of some career employees in the Section. Partisan groups and individuals who opposed the use of photo identification as a matter of policy, cried foul. They erroneously believed that the purpose of the Voting Section was to serve as an additional arm of a political advocacy group and apparently considered the application of facts and law to be “politicization.”

One of the staunchest critics at the hearing was Julie Fernandes, who now serves as the Deputy Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Voting Section. In 2007, Ms. Fernandes was head of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, an organization that opposes the use of photo identification in voting and believes that, “The mission of the Voting Section at the Civil Rights Division is to protect the voting rights of racial, ethnic, and language minorities.”[2] (emphasis added). She testified that the work of the Voting Section is to, “address the unfinished agenda” of the voting rights movement. A movement which she says was, “…born of a need to repair decades of State-sanctioned denial of political equality to millions of American citizens.”[3] While she does not elaborate as to which citizens she is referring, her statement makes clear that she is not talking about all citizens of the United States.

The testimony of Ms. Fernandes and others illustrates that some of those leading the Voting Section believe that its purpose is to protect and promote one class of people. This explains why on July 6, 2010, a former attorney from the Voting Section, Christian Adams, testified to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights that political appointees, like Fernandes, were refusing to impartially enforce federal statutes. Adams described the Department’s decision to abruptly drop a voter intimidation case against the New Black Panthers Party. One would be hard-pressed to imagine a more clear-cut example of voter intimidation under the Voting Rights Act than this case. Men dressed in military garb wielding night sticks and uttering verbal threats to people entering a polling place are actions for which the Voting Rights Act was needed in the first place. In this instance, applying the law in a color blind fashion would not be politicizing the Section but refusing to do so would be.

Mr. Adams also testified that Ms. Fernandes called a meeting of Voting Section employees and told them that Section 8 of the National Voter Registration Act, the section that requires states to maintain accurate voting lists, would not be enforced because it does nothing to increase voter turnout. This mandate does not seem consistent with the implementation of true and fair justice. Yet, it is consistent with her personal opinions about Section 8. At the October 2007 oversight hearing she stated that “…[Section 8 of the] NVRA has been used to do these broad purges that wipe out so many eligible voters for no gain.”[4] (emphasis added).

The citizens of this country have entrusted the employees of the Department of Justice with the task of enforcing laws absent political agendas or personal opinions. In particular, the Voting Section has the obligation to protect all citizens of the United States from barriers that restrict free and fair elections.

Ms. Fernandes should be held to her own standards. In her closing remarks at the 2007 oversight hearing she declared, “We must expect the Civil Rights Division to enforce the Nation’s voting rights laws without fear or favor, and we must demand accountability when they don’t.”[5]

The President must also be held to his word. In a 2007 letter to Acting Attorney General Peter D. Keisler, then Senator Obama said, “The next Attorney General must demonstrate a strong commitment to civil rights.”[6] Mr. Obama must demonstrate this strong commitment to civil rights by directing his Attorney General, Eric Holder to pledge that the Voting Section will not be used as an agency for partisan political purposes. He can do so by promising that all federal voting statutes will be enforced without prejudice and that when they are not, that those in power will be held accountable. To do otherwise would amount to politicization.

-Written by Nicole S. Marrone, Esq.

[1] Under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, certain jurisdictions must receive pre-clearance from either the Department of Justice or a federal district court before they can make any changes pertaining to voting practices or procedures.

[2] Leadership Conference on Civil Rights Education Fund, Long Road to Justice - The Civil Rights Division at 50 34 (2007)

[3] Voting Section of the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice: Hearing Before the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties, Committee on the Judiciary House of Representatives, 110^th Cong. 61 (2007) (statement of Julie Fernandes, Senior Policy Analyst & Special Counsel, Leadership Conference for Civil Rights)

[4] Id. at 111.

[5] Id. at 63.

[6]

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