In past years, Justice Department officials have not listed voter fraud as a top concern when announcing the deployment of election monitors, as Sessions did Monday.
Washington Post: Without Evidence, Trump and Sessions Warn of Voter Fraud in Tuesday’s Elections
11.5.2018 / By Amy Gardner
Washington Post: Without Evidence, Trump and Sessions Warn of Voter Fraud in Tuesday’s Elections
President Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Monday issued strong warnings about the threat of voter fraud in Tuesday’s elections, echoing the president’s baseless claims that massive voter fraud marred his 2016 election and prompting accusations that his administration is trying to intimidate voters. …
“It’s indicative of a pattern with this administration,” said David Vance, a spokesman for Common Cause, a civil rights group that helped recruit 6,500 volunteers to monitor polling locations across the country Tuesday. “It’s an effort to intimidate voters and keep them away from the polls and try to dictate which voters will turn out and which voters won’t. It flies in the face of what the DOJ has done traditionally to protect voters.” …
One bright spot for voting rights advocates has been the boost in turnout among early voters logged across the nation. As of Saturday, the number of people voting early had outpaced that of the 2014 midterm elections in 28 states, according to data compiled by Michael McDonald, a political-science professor at the University of Florida. In two additional states, Texas and Nevada, early voting was on track to surpass the entire vote count four years ago, he said.
Said Vance, of Common Cause: “To turn out and make yourself heard is the primary weapon to combat these attempts to suppress the vote.”