International monitors at US polling places draw criticism

The Hill ^ | 10/20/12 | Alexander Bolton

[Snuph]

United Nations-affiliated election monitors from Europe and central Asia will be at polling places around the U.S. looking for voter suppression activities by conservative groups, aconcern raised by civil-rights groups during a meeting this week. The intervention has drawn criticism from a prominent conservative-leaning group combating election fraud.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), a United Nations partner on democratization and human rights projects, will deploy 44 observers around the county on Election Day to monitor an array of activities, including potential disputes at polling places. Liberal-leaning civil rights groups met with representatives from the OSCE this week to raise their fears about what they say are systematic efforts to suppress minority voters likely to vote for President Obama.

The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, the NAACP andthe ACLU, among other groups, warned this month in a letter to Daan Everts, a senior official with OSCE, of “a coordinated political effort to disenfranchise millions of Americans — particularly traditionally disenfranchised groups like minorities.”

The request for foreign monitoring of election sites drew a strong rebuke from Catherine Engelbrecht, founder and president ofTrue the Vote, a conservative-leaning group seeking to crack down on election fraud.

“These activist groups sought assistance not from American sources, but from the United Nations,” she said ina statement to The Hill. “The United Nations has no jurisdiction over American elections.”

The observers, from countries such as Germany, France, Serbia, Belarus, Ukraine and Kazakhstan, will observe voting at polling places and other political activity.

“They [will] observe the overall election process, not just the ballot casting,” said Giovanna Maiola, spokeswoman for OSCE. “They are focusing ona number of areas on the state level, including the legal system, election administration, the campaign, the campaign financing [and] new voting technologies used inthe different states.”

[Billthedrill]

You might try reading the story a little more closely - they're not here to catch voter fraud, they're here to monitor for conservative poll intimidation. Now tell me, do you recall any U.S. poll observers in your banana republic?

[ConservativeInPA]

Banana Republic anyone ...

Exactly. Thanks Obama.

[livius]

Huh? Who permitted these people to come in and do this?

And why isn’t this on every major news network?

[KarlInOhio]

Even banana republics have voter ID requirements and marking voters' fingers with ink to prevent multiple voting.

I would welcome poll watchers if we could get both of those improvements instituted nationwide. But I don't expect the Dems to allow that, they just want Venezuelan style polling.

[hadaclueonce]

Banana Republic anyone ...

Exactly. Thanks Obama.

There I fixed it.

[livius]

Foreigners, especially you dupe lefty Europeans, have no idea what’s going on here and are being brought in by the left to make things even uglier.

Why don’t you grow up and go back to eating lutefisk in your homeland.

[Bellagio]

This is a joke right?

“...Liberal-leaning civil rights groups met with representatives from the OSCE this week to raise their fears about what they say are systematic efforts to suppress minority voters likely to vote for President Obama.”

BWAHAHAHA!...Fixed it

“...Liberal-leaning civil rights groups met with representatives from the OSCE this week to raise their fears about what they say are systematic efforts to suppress minority voters Democrat Polling Officials from allowing dead people, cats, dogs, bused interstate SEIU members, visiting international Communist sympathizers, Loony Tunes, aliens, felons, imposters, and anyone else with phony ID paid to likely to vote vote for President Obama.”

How in Gods Green Earth can the UN be allowed to invade our sovereignty and interfere with our election process!! It’s none of their G-DAMN business!

For one, voting in US elections is not a HUMAN RIGHTS issue... It’s a US citizenship issue! The right to participate and vote in US elections is a right by statute, actually more of a privilege, which is afforded each and every qualified LEGAL US citizen pursuant to State laws, The US Constitution Amendments and the Voters Rights Act of 1965.

Voting is more a privilege then a right because you can forfeit that right or be disenfranchised under certain circumstances such as felony convictions, State voter identification requirements and voter registration laws. The United States Constitution has several amendments which stop disenfranchising a voter based on discrimination but it is still the responsibility of each and every citizen to take the necessary steps to prove they ARE a US citizen at the polls and can RIGHTFULLY exercise their franchise.

WTF are the UN clowns supposed to be looking for? Making sure that anyone shows up with a temperature of 98.6 cannot be suppressed to vote regardless of citizenship status or qualification just because some European Kangaroo Court on human rights proclaimed that voting is a basic human right? European Courts are for Europe NOT the United States, we are sovereign. Besides... human rights aint the problem, its BEING QUALIFIED. I can’t show up in Germany and just proclaim I have a “Human Right” to vote in their national elections. Sure being human gets you in the voting line but unless you can prove German citizenship... GET LOST!

There is no difference in the argument if compared to the right to own a home or drive a car! Yes, you have the right to own a home... IF YOU CAN AFFORD IT!! Yes you have a right to drive on public roads... IF YOU CAN PROVE FINACIAL RESPOSIBILITY AND PASS A DRIVERS EXAM AND ROAD TEST!

YES you have the right to vote in a US General election... IF YOU CAN PROVE US CITIZENSHIP AND QUALIFY!

[animal172]

I have thought for many years we need to pull out of the UN. It is an anti-American group of thugs and third world dictators. If that doesn’t happen, then the next best thing is to advise them they have one year to vacate the UN property in New York and set up shop in another country.

[sergeantdave]

“We no longer have the America that the Founding Fathers intended for us. “

Don’t be melodramatic. If you see a blue helmet at your polling place, stomp his nuts into the concrete. That’s what Thomas Jefferson would’ve done.

[trebb]

Great shades of Jimmuh Carter observing and blessing the election of dictators. Only this time we'll have fascists raising a ruckus that we suppressed Leftist cheating to the point that they had to try to hide the malfeasance.