TakeAction Minnesota, one of the umbrella organizations powering the Alliance for a Better Minnesota, published this report in their attempt to prove rich bankers financed GOP campaigns in an attempt to suppress voter turnout. The report is aptly titled "The 1% vs. Democracy in Minnesota." One of the first questions asked in the report is more than loaded:
Why would banking executives expend considerable time and resources enacting a legislative agenda in which the lead item is to make it harder for law-abiding eligible voters to exercise their right to vote?
Here's their 'answer':
Consider: Wells Fargo has received $43.7 billion in bailout funds from taxpayers. In both 2009 and 2010, Wells Fargo made $12 billion in profits. Despite this, Wells Fargo paid less in federal income taxes from 2008–2010 than the average Minnesota household.
Instead of returning taxpayer money to the economy, saving Minnesotans’ homes, or working to protect our schools during the foreclosure crisis, Wells Fargo, TCF and U.S. Bank executives and board members have donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to candidates who will make it harder for members of the 99% of the population to vote. These are the same Minnesotans who have been negatively affected by their irresponsible policies.
To summarize, TakeAction Minnesota is skapegoating banks without a scintilla of logic in their desperate attempt to a) extend the storyline of Occupy Wall Street and b) extend the myth that requiring Photo ID automatically leads to voter suppression.
The fact that banks got TARP money has nothing whatsoever to do with local legislative elections. This is one of the silliest non sequiturs imaginable. That's what to expect from TakeAction Minnesota. They'll attempt to cobble together all the pieces of information from their collection of boogeymen to make a semi-coherent argument against Photo ID.
The bad news for the DFL is that people aren't buying their schtick.
TakeAction Minnesota's 'study' isn't the work of a team of determined factfinders. It's the work of spinmeisters. Here's proof of their bloviating:
Kiffmeyer and the bill’s other sponsors claim this law would prevent people from misrepresenting themselves in order to vote, but this is not an actual problem. As a matter of fact, no one has ever been convicted of voter impersonation in Minnesota. The bill’s true aim is to drive down turnout among certain groups of voters.
This is one of the biggest canards in history:
No one has ever been convicted of voter impersonation in Minnesota.
It isn't that this statement isn't factual. It's that nobody's had the tools to look for people committing voter impersonation. Photo ID is that tool. It's galling to think that the people charged with protecting election integrity, from Mark Ritchie to Joe Mansky, refuse to look for the fraud that's apparent to anyone with a lick of common sense.
It's impossible to find what you refuse to look for.
According to recent testimony by the secretary of state’s office, the proposed photo ID amendment could adversely affect more than 700,000 eligible Minnesota voters. This total includes 215,000 registered voters who do not have a Minnesota driver’s license or ID card with a current address on it, and another 500,000 eligible voters who use Election Day registration.
Fixing the same day registration situation is exceptionally easy. Those people who don't already have a valid ID should fill out a provisional ballot. When they get their valid ID, they should present their ID to their county's election officials. The minute that the voter's identity is verified, the provisional ballot is counted as accepted.
This sentence stuck out like a sore thumb:
The bill’s true aim is to drive down turnout among certain groups of voters.
Prior statements of fact in this so-called study were footnoted. This wasn't. That's because it's either speculation or spin, not a statement of fact. As a result, this so-called study is highlighted as spin, not the work of scholars intent on finding the truth wherever it's found.
It's important to know who TakeAction Minnesota is. Here's a list of their member organizations. The list is comprised of the Who's Who of DFL special interest allies. It's comprised by organizations from Minnesota's poverty industry, militant environmentalists, marxists/socialists and public employee unions.
People studying TakeAction Minnesota's 'study' should know that TakeAction Minnesota is one of the organizations that participated in the biggest smear campaign in Minnesota gubernatorial history, aka ABM. ABM is funded in large part by Rockefeller corporate money through Alida Messinger. Alida Messinger's maiden name was Alida Rockefeller. In fact, she's the sister of West Virginia Sen. Jay Rockefeller.
TakeAction Minnesota's 'study' is a farce. It's a propaganda lit piece, nothing more. Their propaganda fits the national pattern of 'the sky is falling' messaging. The verified facts, as certified by Judge Barker, tell an entirely different story.
When confronted with a choice between verifiable facts certified by a judge or Big Labor's propaganda, Big Labor's propaganda doesn't stand much of a chance.
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