According to ThinkProgress, 16 million people were purged from voter rolls between the 2014 mid-terms and 2016 election and those purges disproportionately affected low-income and minority voters. That means, Trump may have actually lost by 19 million votes.
That number was calculated in a new report published on Friday by the Brennan Centre for Justice. It suggests a significant increase from previous years and indicates that large numbers of eligible voters are unable to vote by inaccuracies or unlawful voter roll maintenance.
Voter purging is part of a scheme by Republican politicians who vastly exaggerate the threat of voter fraud in order to push laws and policies that end up disenfranchising voters, often the same group of voters that do not support the Republican platform.
While the Justice Department previously served as a check on states through the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) whose purpose is to “to enhance voting opportunities for every American,” under Trump’s direction, the agency is now eager to promote the aggressive purge of state rolls.
The federal National Voter Registration Act (NVRA), passed in 1993, set standards for how states can maintain their voter rolls. Under the law, states are only allowed to remove voters if they were never eligible to vote, been deemed mentally incompetent, moved residences, or died. States are not permitted to conduct widespread purges in the months leading up to an election.
According to the report however, four states (Florida, New York, North Carolina, and Virginia) have engaged in illegal purges in the last five years and another four (Alabama, Arizona, Indiana, and Maine) have implemented purge rules that violate federal law.
Of course Trump and the GOP is pushing for purges. Trump and the GOP are corrupt. They are corroding away our democracy from the inside as well as letting it be attacked from the outside. We must resist and get out this November and vote! Make yours count for those who have been purged out of a voice.
You can follow me on Twitter @Mayme Barth
