Hans von Spakovsky, as a top political appointee in Bush’s Justice Department, was a leading player in what McClatchy straightforwardly calls the administration’s “vote-suppression agenda.” Specifically, von Spakovsky was “Tweedledee to Schlozman’s Tweedledum at the Civil Rights Division. The two worked together in overseeing the voting rights section, and in particular in ensuring that the section, which is tasked with stopping the implementation of voting laws that might impinge on the rights of minorities, did not block voter ID laws.”
In other words, when it came to disenfranchisement, von Spakovsky was a reliable member of Team Bush.
Now, of course, the president is anxious to give him a promotion, rewarding von Spakovsky with a six-year term on the Federal Election Commission. During his confirmation hearing yesterday, Democratic senators had a few questions about his DoJ work. Wouldn’t you know it, he couldn’t remember.
Time and again during his confirmation hearing, he cited either the attorney-client privilege or a cloudy memory for his purported role in restricting minorities’ voting rights.
Von Spakovsky couldn’t remember blocking an investigation into complaints that a Minnesota Republican official was discriminating against Native American voters before the 2004 election.
Under oath, he also said he didn’t recall seeing data from the state of Georgia that would have undercut a push by senior officials within the Civil Rights Division to approve the state’s tough new law requiring photo IDs of all voters. The data showed that 300,000 Georgia voters lacked driver’s licenses. A federal judge later threw out the law as unconstitutional.
What is it with Republicans and their memories? Giuliani can’t remember being briefed on Bernie Kerik, Alberto Gonzales can’t remember anything, neither can Kyle Sampson, Lurita Doan doesn’t remember important meetings, and John McCain doesn’t remember his policy positions, Karl Rove doesn’t remember talking to Matt Cooper about Valerie Plame. Scooter Libby doesn’t remember how he learned about Plame’s status at the CIA. Condoleezza Rice doesn’t remember Iran reaching out for diplomatic negotiations with the U.S. in 2003.
These poor folks can’t seem to remember much, can they? Aren’t there memory tricks and/or mnemonic techniques that could give them a hand?
As for von Spakovsky specifically, senators asked pointed questions about a Georgia plan he approved, over the objections of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights division, that would have required photo IDs in order to vote.
Asked about the Georgia ID law, von Spakovsky declined to disclose the legal advice he gave his superiors, saying it was privileged, but he maintained that the department took the correct position because the courts didn’t find that the law violated the federal Voting Rights Act. In overturning the law, the federal courts cited the 14th and 24th Amendments to the Constitution, he said.
In other words, the law violated the Constitution, but not the Voting Rights Act, so von Spakovsky gave it the thumbs up.
Sounds like exactly the kind of guy Bush should reward with a promotion.