There’s an excellent article in The Gleaner about what happened in Arizona yesterday. “Waits dragged on as long as five hours in Maricopa County - home to metro Phoenix and 1.2 million voters eligible to cast ballots - but where only 60 polling places were open.” Okay, so many of us already know that, but I want to reiterate it: five hour waits. Who did this hurt worst? Latino precincts but also working people in general, or people with families, who cannot take a holiday to cast their ballot. Thousands and thousands of them apparently! And many more, apparently, were denied the right to vote because their registrations had been recorded incorrectly.
There was a good front-page story yesterday by Joan McCarter that connected what happened in Arizona to the destruction of the Voting Rights Act. Since then, we've heard nothing from the front page about the issue.
Why is the DKos frontpage not covering this further? Apparently because it’s considered a Bernie Sanders issue rather than a Democratic issue. Armando entered the comments today on another diary to say that he wants to remedy voter suppression in November, but there is nothing that can be done about yesterday … no going back. Maybe that is true, or maybe not. Regardless, what happened was a travesty and merits fuller coverage on DKos.
The Democratic Mayor of Phoenix, meanwhile, is taking action not to help Bernie Sanders, or Hillary Clinton, but to help the Democratic Party.
By Wednesday, the mayor of Phoenix said the cutbacks were about more than saving money. Mayor Greg Stanton, a Democrat, called for a federal investigation into whether election officials illegally put fewer polling locations in poor or minority-heavy areas.
Stanton in a letter to the Justice Department also cited examples of other policies adopted by elections officials and the state Legislature that have created "a culture of voter disenfranchisement."
We Kossacks should stand with the Phoenix mayor. Whether we’re for Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders, this is not something to ignore. I have seen other diaries and comments actually blaming the voters of Maricopa County … for electing Republicans to county office, apparently, or for not knowing the rules about registering as a Democrat, etc. As a native-born Arizona, as a Kossack, and as a Democrat, I strongly disagree, and I strongly suggest that this be covered fully on the front page. To my mind, It’s far more newsworthy and important than the latest gaffe made by Cruz or Trump.
Update: Please sign this petition urging the Obama DOJ to investigate Arizona’s voter suppression (thanks to Forgetting for the link in the comment). Petition