Lives of Black Voters in Mississippi Could Be in Danger (for Helping Thad Cochran Win over Chris McDaniel)

 Chris McDaniel Demands Personal Info on Black Voters

I've watched developments in Mississippi with growing horror.  No, I'm not using hyperbole. Sore loser Chris McDaniel seems to have snapped. The Neo-Confederate cannot handle the fact that he lost to his Republican opponent by a large margin of Black Democratic votes.  Yes, he was outmaneuvred with a tactic that the Ku klux Klan would have hung people from trees to ward off in previous times.  But this is no longer that America. Or that is my sincerest hope. Only now McDaniel has petitioned the courts for the personal information, including the birthdates of the Democratic (Black) voters who were legally eligible to vote in the Republican primary, because they hadn't voted in their own, since there was no real contest.

Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood had already explained that each voter has a unique voter identification number that can be used to differentiate between people with similar names or family members, who share the same name. So why exactly must McDaniel have these voters' identifying information?   Remember that supporters of McDaniel broke into a nursing home to photograph his opponent's mentally disabled wife. One of the men involved subsequently committed suicide.  I do not believe that Chris McDaniel had anything to do with this tragic business. But this man appears to attract people with poor judgment or worse. Given Mississippi's sordid racial history, what might a few rogue actors among his already hyped up followers do with the personal information of these Black voters?

Some goons could threaten their livelihoods.  Or for that matter, they might threaten these peoples'  lives if they refused to perjure themselves in court by not going along with some tale concocted by the McDaniel campaign of phony irregularities.

The Voting Rights Act might be all that stands between Mississippi sliding into the Stalingrad River.



UPDATE: July 20, 2014

I am gratified to say that the Mississippi Supreme Court had the decency and good sense to deny the McDaniel request to provide voters' personal identification information to his staff.