Doing the DOJ’s Job for Them: Demanding Valid Voter Rolls Before November
Mr. Depew’s blog makes a couple of errors, three of which I will address.
A. He characterizes the effort to ensure credible voter rolls as “partisan.” That’s an interesting charge without merit given 1) we had no idea what political party Mauro was from, and 2) Republican secretaries of state received similar letters. For example, in Mississippi and South Dakota, the letters went to Republicans. But it is an old standby defense. Can’t blame someone from using a familiar easy talking point.
B. There are numerous statistical errors in Mr. Depews blog discussing Iowa. But I’ll point out just one. Depew makes absolutely no adjustment for CVAP – or citizen voting age population. He provides the number for TVAP (total voting age population) at 3410. The more relevant number is CVAP. CVAP < TVAP. CVAP may be equal to TVAP, but that is unlikely. Whether or not the deviation is significant is an outstanding issue, but the fact is Mr. Depew disregarded this entirely. There are obviously lots more than can be said about statistics, but here is not the place. I only note one obvious error of Mr. Depew to illustrate that his polemic has gaps.
C. It is a shame that debates about proper enforcement of Motor Voter Section 8 can't have more credible and measured language. Claiming someone wants to "make Iowa look bad" (See A above) or calling people "partisan hacks trying to gin up fears of dead people" (Id.) is both untrue, but undermines the credibility of whatever argument accompanies it. Normally I don't respond to that sort of bombast, but given the obvious error in both his math, and his obloquy, I'll respond, once.
