91,000 still barred from voting in Florida

[Steven]

http://www.gregpalast.com/detail.cfm?artid=176&row=0


Exclusive Expose in Salon: Jeb Bush Bars Black Voters from Tuesday Poll
Salon Magazine
Friday, November 1, 2002
Jeb Crow?

There they go again.

Today's Salon.com exclusive by investigative reporter Greg Palast: 

Florida moves to bar 91,000 legal voters - mostly Democrats - from
Tuesday poll 

>From the Salon.com article:

In December 2000, we reported that Florida's use of a faulty and
politically questionable list of felons and dead people "scrubbed" from
voter rolls -- half of them African-Americans -- may have cost Al Gore
the 537-vote margin of victory claimed by George W. Bush in Florida. 

Fast-forward two years. There's another close race in Florida. This
time, younger brother Jeb is fighting to fend off a challenge from Bill
McBride for the governor's race. The Nov. 5 face-off could again come
down to thousands, if not hundreds, of votes. 

And even though the list has been widely condemned -- the company that
created it admits probable errors -- the same voter scrub list, with
more than 94,000 names on it, is still in operation in Florida.
Moreover, DBT Online, which generated the disastrously flawed list,
reports that if it followed strict criteria to eliminate those errors,
roughly 3,000 names would remain -- and a whopping 91,000 people would
have their voting rights restored. 

Eventually the list will be fixed, state officials have promised, in
accordance with a settlement with the NAACP in its civil rights suit
against Florida following the 2000 election. But not until the beginning
of next year -- and after Jeb Bush's reelection bid is long over. 

###

Catch the rest of the story on http://www.Salon.com. 

Media requests for entire article and/or interview with author, contact:
Fredda at GregPalast.com

or (561) 499-4291 or Patrick Hurley at Salon (415) 645-9320


This month, PBS stations nationwide will broadcast "Counting on
Democracy," featuring Palast's investigation of state manipulation of
the vote in Florida during the 2000 presidential election. Local
broadcast times for the film, directed by Emmy award-winner Danny
Schechter, can be found at at http://www.GregPalast.com (Events) - where
you can also read and subscribe to Greg Palast's London Observer columns
and view his reports for BBC Television's Newsnight. 

http://www.salon.com/politics/feature/2002/11/01/lists/index.html

_________________________________
Steven