ACORN, Project Vote attack Jackson County elections
Project Vote and the Association of Community Organization for Reform Now, which ran into election-related controversy itself earlier this month when it submitted voter registration cards that were later disqualified, said the Jackson County Elections Board is preventing rejected applications from being resubmitted.
The groups said in the release that they have tried to acquire records of disqualified voters to urge them correct their applications or file new ones, but said that board is claiming that it is illegal under state law to give them the lists. The groups said that elections boards in St. Louis City and St. Louis County have submitted their lists to the groups.
The groups said that, of 1520 disqualified applications in Jackson County, 905 were rejected because they were returned by the post office. The groups said the board offered to provide the lists to Project Vote for, according to the release, $7.50 a page.
Brian Mellor, counsel for Project Vote, said voter registration applications are rejected because of incomplete information, confusing forms or address problems.
"There are still thousands of Americans who believe they have completed a voter registration application and are registered to vote, bit in fact are not," Mellor said.
Charlene Davis, co-director of the Jackson County Elections Board, said she is "not surprised" by the groups' claims, and said rejected applicants can still be made eligible to vote.
"If any of these people are going to show that they're real people, they're going to vote," Davis said. "That's our job."