The paranoia over undocumented immigrants flooding our voting booths is beyond the pale.
And yet Kansas legislators, for fear they would appear unpatriotic, fell for it in 2011 when they passed the first law in the nation to require proof of citizenship to vote.
As architect of the Kansas voting law, Secretary of State Kris Kobachs goal is to make us all think twice about giving newcomers the benefit of the doubt when it comes to their citizenship; as if that were a precursor of their character. Such fear-mongering works to turn us into a guarded and suspicious people a far cry from our former selves.
On Monday, Chief District Judge Julie Robinson pulled the curtain aside, showing the Kansas law is not only overkill, but illegal. To date, the law has prevented more than 30,000 voter applications from being processed.
In the three years since its enactment, Kobach has found 11 cases of fraud in which voters voted twice in different states. None involved undocumented immigrants.
Those statistics are all the proof we need to know that voter fraud is neither widespread nor a threat to our democracy.
If anything, immigrants are role-model citizens.
A recent study by the libertarian Cato Institute, in fact, found that in Texas the rate of crimes committed by immigrants in 2015 was 85 percent below that of native-born citizens, as reported in todays Washington Post.
Kobachs goal of casting a wide net of aspersion over those who immigrate here is nothing short of racism.
Not to be deterred, Kobach maintains this is just the tip of the iceberg.
Dont fall for it.
And more importantly, stand up to such chicanery. Kobach knows voter fraud is, in fact, a fraud but uses it as an effective ploy to tap into Americans fears that we are somehow being robbed of our livelihoods by outside forces. Thats always the preferable answer when things go wrong.
KANSAS legislators should waste no time in not only rescinding the law but also Kobachs ability to prosecute voter fraud the only Secretary of State granted such powers.
Its time Kansas got a backbone. Republicans can take the first step in that direction by denying Kobach the GOP nomination for governor.
Susan Lynn