Alabama elections chief wants to send citizens to prison for 5 years for voting

[turbinetree]

Source: Think Progress

Alabama’s Republican secretary of state wants potentially 674 Alabama citizens who voted both in this year’s Democratic primary and Republican runoff elections, in violation of a new law, to be charged with a felony and imprisoned for five years.

Secretary of State John Merrill’s office has referred the names of 674 people who voted in the August Democratic primary and then last month’s Republican runoff to local elections officials, tasking them with investigating the list for errors. Prosecutors will then decide whether to bring charges against the individuals for violating the crossover voting ban, signed by Gov. Kay Ivey (R-AL) in May to prevent members of one party from meddling in the other party’s election.

Merrill told ThinkProgress in an interview Tuesday that he thinks the individuals who switched party affiliations should be sent to prison for five years and hit with a $15,000 fine, the maximum allowable punishment for the low-level felony.

Read more: https://thinkprogress.org/crossover-voting-alabama-9b0eda42de54/

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[SCVDem]

1. Ex Post Facto laws are not legal

Which country do these yahoos live in?

[DBoon]

3. the Confederacy

Still haven't accepted the results of that war

[Scoopster]

5. True, but this isn't an example of EPF.

This law went into effect in May, before the primaries for the special election.

[riversedge]

17. Wonder how good, if any the state did education on this new law???

[syringis]

6. Indeed

It is illegal anywhere for an obvious reason : arbitrary.

Reactivity is allowed in criminal matters and only if it benefits a suspect.

These lawmakers are lawbreakers more like...

As the Rep senator who suggested to overrule an universal principle, no less ! Diane Black in Tennessee proposed to allow emergency rooms to refuse patients...

As lawyer, these ignorants drive me up the wall !!!

[Demit]

8. The law was passed in May. The elections were in August & September.

So the (ridiculously under publicized) law was in effect at the time of the elections.

[geretogo]

2. The next step will be a blue star on the chest and put in an internment camp for not following

the rules of Der Fuer Trump .

[yallerdawg]

4. Locking people up for voting.

Republican depravity knows no bounds.

Let's see who is on the list and who the locals choose to prosecute.

We can all guess who they will be discriminately targeting!

Alabama Republicans love to waste money on unconstitutional and illegal activities, so...

[Atman]

7. It it could be shown they voted for Trump it would not be an issue.

Anything is okay if you're a Republican.

[barbtries]

9. Alabama.

still representing the Confederacy 150+ years later.
at this point i don't even want to drive through that state.
Siegelman
Roy Moore
this
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/06/23/get-out-of-jail-inc
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/alabama-law-drives-out-illegal-immigrants-but-also-has-unexpected-consequences/2012/06/17/gJQA3Rm0jV_story.html?utm_term=.1b8c999501ee

other states are pretty bad and almost all in the South, i know. I live in NC and the Republican legislature has been dragging it down for about 7 years now. but Alabama seems somehow special after what they did to Don Siegelman.

[Honeycombe8]

10. That sounds like a flaw in their system.

It's possible that many of those people didn't know they weren't supposed to vote in one or the other of those elections. But the elections officers are supposed to have a valid roll of who CAN vote in each election.

[onenote]

11. I have no real problem with this law, but think the penalties are ridiculous

I don't know of any jurisdiction where a voter is allowed to cast ballots in both the Democratic and Republican primaries. Given that the runoff was an extension of the Republican primary, it makes sense not to allow someone to vote in the runoff if they weren't permitted to cast a vote in the original Republican primary because they voted in the Democratic primary. The same would be the case if the circumstances were flipped -- I would think it entirely appropriate to bar someone who voted in the Republican primary --and who therefore wasn't permitted to also vote in the Democratic primary -- to vote in a runoff of the Democratic primary.

But treating voting in the runoff after voting in the other party's primary as a felony is absurd. At most it should be a minor misdemeanor.

[yallerdawg]

12. It wasn't illegal until this year.

Both parties allowed crossover voting until this runoff.

You vote in a party primary for one candidate maybe local, and then get a chance to have your voice heard in a runoff election.

They're backdooring a party registration where there is none!

[onenote]

15. It was against Democratic Party rules but those rules were unenforceable

It wasn't against Republican party rules.

Now it applies both ways and is enforceable.

[rainin]

13. Gotta fill those private prisons. n/t

[mopinko]

14. this shouldnt be on the voter. should be on election officials.

shows they didnt properly update the voter rolls.
those people shouldnt have had an application for ballot in the book.
prosecute them.

[mountain grammy]

16. I say take them out and shoot them,

the gov and secretary of state that is.

[jmowreader]

18. I wonder...

How many of the 674 who did this were Republicans who crossed over to try to advance the weakest Democrat to the general election?

[johnsonsnap]

19. Since they voted for one of those Republicans...

I don't have a problem with this.