Posted on 06/27/2002 8:06:33 AM PDT by yella rose
[ The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: 6/27/02 ]
McKinneys 'guilty' of rescuing voters
By J.M. RAFFAUF
T. Levette Bagwell / Staff
On Election Day 2000, a crowd of voters still packed the halls at 10 p.m. at Stoneview Elementary School. Most had been in line for hours.
By poll closing time on Nov. 7, 2000, long lines had developed at the Stoneview precinct in DeKalb County. Hundreds of people were waiting to vote. Poll workers were able to process only 100 voters per hour.
As the polls closed at 7 p.m., many were locked out or otherwise discouraged from voting both by long lines and harassment from four Republican Party officials who showed up. The long lines were caused by the DeKalb County Elections Office. But four GOP officials were to blame for locking voters out and discouraging them from voting. These party officials have escaped investigation as well as punishment.
It is ironic that the people who saved the day for the voters -- U.S. Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-Ga.) and her father, state Rep. Billy McKinney (D-Atlanta) -- were harassed by the DeKalb County Republicans, who accused them of violating state election law.
The lines were caused by three factors:
An extraordinary number of voters -- 1,876 of 2,216 registered voters in that precinct -- showed up that day, but there were only a handful of machines to process their votes.
There were only four phone lines to the DeKalb Registrar's office, which had just moved to a new location. Poll workers could not get through with complaints or requests for more machines.
The area supervisor disappeared that day. He could have gotten more machines. He had been seen last at 5:30 p.m. and had noted the long lines, but said he did not know he could get more machines.
The McKinneys became involved only because of numerous calls, starting around 7 p.m., from voters. The McKinneys went to Stoneview to check out the problems and found that Republican poll watchers were trying to lock out voters because, they said, no one could vote after 7 p.m.
Georgia law states that voters must be allowed to vote after 7 p.m. if they are "already qualified and or inside the enclosed space." Here, the voters were qualified before 7 p.m., having filled out the voter information slip provided by poll workers and then holding onto it until they voted. In fact, it was determined that no person voted illegally.
The Republican poll watchers had been sent to Stoneview after receiving false information from the GOP that more than 1,000 people had arrived after 7 p.m. The poll manager, Ruby Johnson, reported to these Republicans that all voters in line had a certificate.
Even so, the DeKalb County Republicans set out to deny hundreds of voters in line at 7 p.m. their right to vote. They even ordered the doors to the precinct locked so that legitimate voters could not vote.
These white Republicans naturally called the police for "crowd control" of black voters. No arrests were made, and no officer reported the need for any crowd control measures. In fact, one DeKalb police officer stated that when the crowd heckled him, Cynthia McKinney took the bullhorn and came to his assistance by calming the crowd.
Congresswoman McKinney called the secretary of state's office and talked to an official there who set up a conference call with DeKalb elections official Linda Lattimore, who agreed to provide additional voting machines.
The McKinneys got the problems fixed, opening up the doors locked by the Republicans and getting more voting machines for the voters.
Faced with a failed mission, the DeKalb County Republicans, who attempted to stop legitimate voters, turned their efforts to the McKinneys, who deprived them of their intentions.
The Republicans interfered with the right to vote of the people of DeKalb County.
These egregious criminal violations have been completely overlooked by the media and state and county officials. Ignoring the real felons, we have been diverted to a sideshow over whether the McKinneys entered the precinct to solicit votes. All they did was urge people to stay and exercise their constitutional right to vote under some of the most intimidating and trying circumstances, which should have been eradicated by the civil rights movement.
J.M. Raffauf is an attorney representing U.S. Rep. Cynthia McKinney and state Rep. Billy McKinney.
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