“It’s … a certainty that aliens will be allowed to vote in this primary election …” Secretary of State Kris Kobach said, after Shawnee County District Court Judge Larry Hendricks ruled votes of people who registered without proof of citizenship documentation must be counted.
The ruling, in response to an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit, means 17,600 people who registered at motor vehicle offices will be affected. About 50,000 Kansans would vote on Nov. 8, if another hearing bears the same results.
Their votes would have counted regardless in national elections, and now do in local and state races.
Kobach has railed about violations and found the means to put into place strict regulations for voters, including photographic proof of identity. The outcome has been fewer registrations, and votes.
Kobach’s rationale is that illegals — Hispanics who have crossed the border to work in the United States — are clamoring for the right to vote.
Really?
Only a meager number of violations of election laws have surfaced in recent years, mostly because of an oversight on the part of the voter and with no nefarious intent.
Further, why an “alien” — Kobach loves to denigrate with the term — would want to vote if he or she is uncertain, or knows, they are in the country illegally? Trying to register, much less vote, under any circumstances would lead to them being found out, and face deportation.
Non-citizens here legally with work or visitor permits might like the opportunity to vote, but if they have done all the right things to be in the U.S. why would they jeopardize their stay?
The answer is obvious to any thoughtful person.
Meanwhile, without doubt Kobach has used the illegal-voting strategy — fear of the unknown, don’t you know — as a campaign tool to be elected to the statewide position he holds and the skinny from Topeka is he will try to capitalize on it again in two years to go after the governorship.
Our great hope is when the campaign for governor rolls around — it can come none too soon — whoever files is more moderate than Sam Brownback, and Kobach, both of whom are a little to the right of Attila the Hun.
— Bob Johnson
