HungryBlues

Voter Fraud

A couple of nights ago I blogged a despicable case of racist voter fraud charges in Georgia that were being used to challenge the registrations of almost every eligible Hispanic voter in Atkinson County. I'm happy to report that the creeps who forced a public hearing on the legitimacy of these voters have been told that "The challenges ... are legally insufficient because they are based solely on race."

In my post on the Georgia story, I linked to Prometheus 6 on why Republican voter fraud charges are usually not to be taken seriously. If you're following the news on voting problems, you know that Republican cries of voter fraud are getting louder and more numerous as we get closer to Nov. 2. Today, Rivka over at Respectful For Otters takes apart the "evidence" supplied in many of the Republican charges.

People are registering at addresses where they don't live, as evidenced by returned mail.

The Republican Party of Ohio sent registered letters to tens of thousands of newly registered voters. A lot of those letters came back as undeliverable, which the Republicans claim is prima facie evidence that those voters don't exist at those addresses.

But what happens when someone tries to deliver a registered letter, and you aren't home? Around here, the mail carrier leaves a little slip inviting you to pick up the letter at the post office. And my carrier always notes who the letter is from.

Now imagine that you're a Democrat, and you get a registered letter from the Republican Party. Why on earth would you go all the way down to the post office and wait in line to pick it up? What could the Republican Party possibly have to say that you'd be interested in reading? Most likely, you ignore the letter. Eventually, the post office returns it to the sender as "undeliverable." [snip]

There are more registered voters than eligible voters in some Ohio cities.

What happens when you move, and have to re-register to vote at your new address? You fill out a voter registration card and send it in. The elections board adds you to the rolls for your new precinct and notifies your old precinct that you're no longer registered there. Eventually, your old precinct takes you off the rolls. But that process isn't instantaneous. There's nothing unusual or improper about voters temporarily appearing on the rolls twice, while the bureaucracy grinds through the process of removing them from their previous precinct of record. In particular, it's not surprising that, as voter registration deadlines approach, elections boards are more concerned about adding people to the rolls than they are about removing them from the rolls.

None of this adds up to fraud until a voter actually votes twice. And none of it is under the control of individual voters or organizations conducting voter registration drives. When I moved from the suburbs to the city, it wasn't up to me to tell my suburban precinct not to let me vote there anymore. It was up to the elections board. Did my name appear on the rolls of my suburban precinct for the primary election, when I voted in the city? I have no idea. I didn't try to vote there. So even if my name were on the rolls twice, no fraud was committed.

People have been submitting voter registrations under names like "Mary Poppins" and "Mickey Mouse."

That's what happens when you pay your voter registration workers by the completed form, instead of by the hour. This is perfectly well known, which is why most legitimate voter registration organizations don't give employees or volunteers incentives to forge registrations. Sure, it's fraud on the part of the guy standing outside the supermarket with a clipboard - but is it really going to lead to voter fraud? Could it really be part of a Democratic scheme to stuff the ballot box? I can't see how.

Let's try to imagine how that scenario would play out, shall we?

Someone shows up at the polls in a swing state and tells a pollworker, "My name is Mickey Mouse."

And the pollworker says... "Okay, Mr. Mouse, here's your ballot." The pollwatchers on hand from either party look on, sipping their coffee in unsuspecting bliss. . . .

(Whole thing.)

At the end of her post, Rivka links to the DLC's New Donkey on the tactical underpinnings of Republican voter challenges in Ohio.

The latest political news from Ohio is important and instructive. A federal judge in Columbus blocked Republican efforts to force county election boards to review tens of thousands of new voter registrations. Before the ink was dry on the judge's order, the Ohio GOP's top lawyer said the action meant the GOP would challenge such voters at the polls on November 2. "We wanted to have all these questions resolved this week," said attorney Mark Weaver. "Now they won't be resolved until Tuesday, when all of these people are trying to vote. It can't help but create chaos, longer lines and frustration."

In other words, the GOP is using the demise of one prong of its voter suppression strategy to pre-justify the other. And I wouldn't be surprised if that's exactly the way they planned it. Now they can can get their "volunteers" out to "create chaos, longer lines and frustration" in minority polling places and sadly say that an "activist judge" who didn't care about voter fraud left them no choice.

For certain the Republican strategy is to suppress minority votes at all costs. The viscous and dogged persistence of the Republicans in their efforts belies their shameless intent to steal another election. As I will discuss in my next post, the Republican tactics are also part of a broader, deeply alarming agenda to redefine federal protections for voting rights.

Georgia On My Mind

I was going to blog about Greg Palast's new revelations and about the latest development in Duvall county (via Body and Soul), and about a few other things (Kevin Drum via Vote Watch 2004), but when I was driving to work earlier this evening, I heard this story on NPR [realplayer], and it made me sick to my stomach for two hours. There's no text version to link to, but the summary blurb reads:

Three white residents in rural Georgia have challenged most Hispanic voter registrations in their precinct, charging they are fraudulent. Most of those challenged have already proven their legal status as voters, but one wants a public hearing.

The only original news coverage in print is at WALB News, Albany, Georgia.

Ninety-eight letters were sent by the Board of Registrars to Hispanics registered to vote in Atkinson County. A version in both English and Spanish informs them of a challenge to their right to vote based on the fact that registered voters must be legal U.S. citizens.

You have to listen to Pam Fessler's NPR piece to understand that that's ninety-eight Hispanics out of the county's 123. The Hispanic voter who wants a public hearing is Antonio Hernandez, who was born in Texas thirty years ago and has lived in Georgia for the last twenty. According to Frank Sutton (in the WALB story), one of the three who initiated the challenge to almost every Atkinson County hispanic voter,

We discovered quite accidentally that we had a lot of non-citizens registered to vote in Atkinson County.

Pam Fessler reports that Sutton came into the office of the Election Superintendent and asked for the names of every Hispanic voter in the county. The Superintendent also explains that under Georgia law, any registered voter can challenge the legitimacy of any other voter if he or she believes there is a reason. These challenge rules were instituted in Georgia and in other states for the specific purpose of keeping Black voters from the polls. And what was Sutton's "reason" for challenging the registrations of as many Hispanic voters as he could? Here's Sutton, verbatim from Fessler's report:

We're contesting these because of a deep belief on my part that citizens of the United States are the ones that people have died for to give us the right to vote. That's the reason that we're contestin' these people that we feel the vast majority of 'em are not citizens of the United States.

That's right, Frank Sutton is contesting the right of US citizens to vote wholly on the basis of their ethnicity—a practice of selection also known as racial profiling. This white, southern man, who appears old enough to have fully enjoyed the benefits of segregation, uses racial profiling and Jim Crow tactics to keep Hispanics from voting, all in the name of the Southern Freedom Movement.

Now do you call that civil rights?
No, no
You call that civil rights?
No, no
You call that civil rights?
No, no
Scandalize my name. If you read the whole article on the WALB News site or watch the streamed video of the newscast, you might get the impression that this is a story about a possible voter fraud case, where 98 Hispanics may all be trying to falsely register. Listen to Pam Fessler's article and decide for yourself. You would, however, do well to remember Earl Dunovant's words from yesterday morning, "Republicans have made such charges before, and they never find supporting evidence."

---------
photo: Frank Sutton on streamed video, WALB News, Channel 10, Albany Georgia.

The Rules

Your first problem if you aspire to vote but your color isn't white and you live in the South, is how to get your name on the registration books as qualified to vote and to keep it there.

Originally registration was designed merely as a means of preventing unscrupulous persons from casting more than one ballot, but Negro Emancipation prompted Southern officials to seize upon registration requirements, as a means of barring Negroes from the polls.

To begin with, many Southern states open their books for new registrants for a very limited time only—generally at a time far removed from an election, so that public interest would be at a low ebb. Indeed, the opening of the books is often something of a state secret, as there is no desire on the part of the incumbents to increase the number of white voters either. . . .

If you do go to your county courthouse to register, in segregated territory you will doubtless find two lines—one for whites, one for Negroes. If you are a Negro, it might be well to take along a box lunch of some sort, as it is not unheard of for Negro applicants to be kept standing in line for one or more days. . . .

Your session with the registrar may be something of an ordeal. . . . [I]n some states the registrar may simply qualify certain applicants as being "of good character and understanding the duties of citizenship." This latter criterion, however, you will generally find reserved for white folks.

This machinery thus enables the registrar to refuse to register you if you are a Negro and he so chooses . . .

Of course, you are free to appeal against a registrar's decision in the courts, but by the time a ruling can be had, the election will undoubtedly be over. . . .

The current trend is for the states to vest more and more discretionary power in the registrars so that the actual discrimination can be left to them, without appearing in statutory form. . . .

Don't think, if you put on the uniform of the United States in time of war to defend democracy, that this will in any wise improve your chances of voting in the South when the war is over if your skin color isn't white. On the contrary, special efforts have been made to deter Negro war veterans from voting. . . .

Should you succeed in getting your name on the list of qualified voters, your troubles may have only begun. . . .

For one thing, your name may be purged from the list before you get a chance to vote. . . . In some counties the vast majority of Negro registrants were stricken from the lists. Appeals to the U.S. Department of Justice were in vain. . . .

Any white person, it would appear, can challenge any number of Negroes on all sorts of grounds. For instance, G. R. Fossett, who purged 183 Negroes from the voting list of Spaulding County, Georgia, admitted that he did so solely on the basis of their handwriting. . . .

If you are a Negro and your name is on a voters' list somewhere in segregated territory, as Election Day draws nigh you may decide that those whose names are merely purged are the lucky ones.

While the hand of every white man may not be turned against you, you may get the impression that it is. Candidates, officeholders, law enforcement officers, and Klansmen may severally or collectively resort to intimidation and violence to dissuade you from actually going to the polls. . . .

If, despite such as this, you persist in going to the Polls, be careful not to take with you any sort of memorandum—even one you prepared yourself—because election officials are in the habit of arresting Negroes early in the day on charges of carrying "dummy ballots," so that the publicity in the afternoon papers will deter other Negroes from voting. . . .

Don't think that by establishing residence in one of the 150 or more Southern counties where Negroes are still in the majority you can find more self-government; the more Negroes there are in any given political entity down South, the less the political expression permitted them.

If you happened to be visiting in Great Britain while the U.S. State Department had on display there its exhibit "Souvenirs of American Elections," complete with facsimile of the Declaration of Independence, you shouldn't think you could go back to the American South in this century and raise the standard of the American Revolution, "No Taxation without Representation!," with impunity. Nor would the latter-day Tories of the American South be likely to tolerate any refusal on the part of Negro Southerners to pay taxes on this basis.

--Excerpts from "Who May Vote Where," Chapter 10 of Stetson Kennedy, The Jim Crow Guide: The Way It Was (1959)

            ***         ***         ***Update: David Scott Anderson took the time to explain to me something about blogging etiquette I hadn't understood before—that when I send a trackback it should be from a post that explicitly links to the one I pinged. I have often sent trackbacks simply to alert other bloggers that my post is relevant to theirs. So, without further ado, here are some blogs with recent posts on Republican use of overt Jim Crow tactics to suppress the votes of African Americans and other minorities.

In Search Of Utopia
Blogs Of War
DebWire
Oliver Willis

If You Know Any Republican Or Undecided Voters Who Might Be Influenced By Facts

direct them to eRiposte's John Kerry For Dummies.

(eRiposte is the same person who brought you Vote Watch.)

You, Too, Could Be A Poll Watcher

Unable to counter the bad news with stories of major successes, the Bush campaign has turned almost exclusively to the so-called war against terror. The message in a nutshell: be very afraid.

A Bush campaign commercial released a few days ago shows wolves advancing menacingly toward the camera. A voice in the ad says, "Weakness attracts those who are waiting to do America harm."

At the same time, the Republican Party is doing what it can in key states to block as many Democratic votes as possible. Party officials have mounted a huge organized effort to challenge - some would say intimidate - voters in states like Ohio and Florida, in a bid to offset the effects of huge voter registration drives and a potentially heavy turnout of voters opposed to Mr. Bush and his policies.

Election officials in Ohio said they'd never seen such a large drive mounted to challenge voters on Election Day.

Voter suppression is a reprehensible practice. It's a bullet aimed at the very heart of democracy. But the G.O.P. evidently considers it an essential strategy in an environment with so little positive news. (Bob Herbert)

The Republican sponsored Jim Crow 2004 campaign is in full swing. Decent, democracy-loving people are rightfully enraged. There is renewed talk about the important Election Protection campaign to protect voting rights. If you'd like to help but cannot travel to one of the high stakes locales, check out election Match. There, you can plug in the info about where you'd like to work and they'll match you up with a local, non-profit, non-partisan poll-watching group.

I personally cannot travel because of my family obligations, but I'm going to do poll watching in my own community, in the Boston area, where Kerry's victory is assured. Even where there are not outright attempts at election theft, the system is broken (lost votes, polling sites) and probably won't get fixed without local activism throughout the country. Our electoral system is so decentralized [pdf] that even good, well funded federal legislation to fix the problems (as compared to the Help America Vote Act) would be quite difficult to fashion and implement. Get involved now because you're afraid the Republicans will steal another election—and use this is as an opportunity to stay active in making our electoral system democratic.

(Note that poll watching organizations need to train their volunteers and time is running low. You probably need to act now if you want to take part in this important means of improving our democracy.)

My First Meme

Haven't done one of these before, but this one from Rox Populi (via Body and Soul) seemed fun. The instructions are: "get out your moble tune device, set to random play and list the first ten songs." Here's what I got on mine:

Peretz Tants — The Klezmatics
Weary Blues — Louis Armstrong and His Hot 7
Can't Get That Woman Off My Mind — Lightnin' Hopkins
Hitler In My Heart — Antony and the Johnsons
The Rooster Moans — Iron and Wine
Daybreak Blues — The Port of Harlem Jazzmen
Saturday Sun — Nick Drake
I'm Yours — Billie Holiday
Yellow Submarine — The Beatles
Faith Children — Little Wings

Jeanne asks further, "What does your list say about you?" I wish I knew . . .

p.s. do I understand how to use "meme" correctly?

Eriposte: Vote Watch 2004

There is now a good single site to go to if you're trying to follow all of the funny business in our broken electoral system. Vote Watch 2004 "is dedicated to tracking voting irregularities, vote suppression, vote fraud, voter intimidation and other such acts of compassionate conservatism during Election 2004." Actually, aside from it being a good resource for anyone who cares about these issues, here's the part I like:

The inspiration for this site is in part Florida 2000. But it is also in part - history.

Check it out.

(via Ampersand)

Oh . . .

Feeling a little bit like I just got home from a dinner party where I wasn't getting the allusions to current events in smart conversation. I'm actually a little amazed that I didn't realize the shadow on the flag on this week's New Yorker is the silhouette of the Iraqi torture victim whose image has become emblematic of American abuses at Abu Ghraib. When I saw that image I immediately saw a Klansman in his robe and hood. I'm sure this reflects my obsession with the specters of American racism, which are much less ghostly than we'd like to believe. The title of the image, from which I titled my post—A Shadow Over The Election—also encouraged my misreading, since it echoes the title of the recent report by the NAACP and People for the American Way, The Long Shadow of Jim Crow: Voter Intimidation and Suppression in America Today . While I think there is something accurate in confusing images of racism against Black Americans and racism against Iraqi Muslims, it's not exactly right to take an image of a victim for that of a perpetrator.

A Shadow Over The Election

ASK YOURSELF THIS
IMPORTANT QUESTION:
WHAT HAVE I PERSONALLY DONE TO
MAINTAIN Segregation?

If the answer disturbs you, probe deeper and decide what you are willing to do to preserve racial harmony in Selma and Dallas County.

Is it worth four dollars to prevent a "Birmingham" here? That's what it costs to be a member of your Citizens' Council, whose efforts are not thwarted by courts which give sit-in demonstrators legal immunity, prevent school boards from expelling students who participate in mob activities and would place federal referees at the board of voter registrars.

Law enforcement can be called only after these things occur, but your Citizens' Council prevents them from happening. . . .

Is it worth four dollars to you to prevent sit-ins, mob marches and wholesale Negro voter registration efforts in Selma?

(From the Selma Times Journal, Sunday, June 9, 1963, reprinted in James Forman, The Making of Black Revolutionaries, p. 316)

This afternoon, while my son was napping, I heard the mail come through the slot and make the thunk it makes on the floor when there's a magazine. As I went over to pick up the mail I didn't expect to find myself looking at a perfect visual analog to one of Jeanne D'Arc's current posts, which I had just been reading. But the cover of this week's New Yorker by Françoise Mouly captures exactly what lurks behind the story from the Washington Post which Jeanne comments on.

The Washington Post article is about Blacks in Jacksonville, Florida who are finding new challenges to their voting rights.

Despite attempts by Florida officials to prevent a repeat of the controversy that dogged the last presidential election, black leaders said they are concerned that this year new registrations are being rejected for technical errors and that limited accessibility to early polling places could lead to more disputes, roiling Florida and the nation long after Election Day.

For me, the key part of Jeanne's quote from the article was here:

records show that the number of blacks added to the rolls since 2000 approximately equals the number of non-Hispanic whites.

You see, Jacksonville is in Duval County, one of the Florida counties that historically has been part of the Southern Black Belt. Black Belt counties have typically been the seat of some of the fiercest White Supremacism. In Dallas County, Alabama for example,

the ratio was 57.7 percent "nonwhites" to 42.3 percent [whites] (census figures for 1960). Of the blacks, 84 percent existed on less than three thousand dollars a year and 82 percent of those who worked held jobs as maids, janitors, farm and other kinds of laborers, truck drivers, and helpers. Of the blacks over twenty-five years old, 95 percent had less than a high school education, while 62 percent had completed six years or less of school. Among the whites on the other hand, 81 percent had incomes of three thousand dollars a year or more while 73 percent fell into the better paid and more desirable job categories, and only 11 percent had six or less years of school.

In Dallas County, only 130 black people were registered to vote out of an eligible 15,115 according to a 1961 Civil Rights Commission report. Adjoining Wilcox County had never had a black voter, although its population was 78 percent black. Lowndes County, which also borders Dallas and also has a huge black majority, had never had registered black person either. . . . During the Civil War Selma had been one of the most important military depots of the Confederacy. In 1963 it was the birthplace and stronghold of the White Citizens' Council, the authors of that advertisement in the Selma Times Journal. Nothing had changed. (Forman, 317-18)

Black citizens were excluded from voting in order to deprive them of resources and power. It's important to say this because, while there is all too much truth in the caricature of the racist, seething with pathological hatred for Blacks, such images limit racism to something individually felt, something that is largely emotional and reactive. It is that, of course, but personalized, visceral race hatred goes hand in hand with calculated deprivations of rights and resources—thus our country's infamous voter application forms and literacy tests as well as the orchestrated terror campaigns of the KKK designed to intimidate and subdue Blacks.

Is it hyperbolic to note that Florida has one of the more active Klans in the country and that Jacksonville has its own chapter of the Council of Conservative Citizens? I would say, no. I believe these facts, along with a perusal of Jacksonville's history, are essential for understanding the recent events in Duval County and what goes on in Florida elections in general. But let's stay closer to the article Jeanne brought to our attention. Here's what she quoted in full:

[i]n Duval County, 31,155 black voters had been added to the rolls by the end of last week. That is more than the total number of ballots nullified here four years ago, in a race that George W. Bush won by 537 votes.

But hundreds more could show up at the polls only to find they cannot vote. The office has flagged 1,448 registrations as incomplete, and as of last week had yet to process 11,500 more.

A Washington Post analysis found nearly three times the number of flagged Democratic registrations as Republican. Broken down by race, no group had more flagged registrations than blacks.

This, in a heavily GOP county where records show that the number of blacks added to the rolls since 2000 approximately equals the number of non-Hispanic whites.

When Jeanne comments on voter registrars who are "really picky about accepting new voter registrations -- but only in a county that has a huge increase in the registration of black voters," she's alluding to this part of the article, which she didn't quote:

Secretary of State Glenda E. Hood, a Republican appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush, the president's brother, recently ruled that for registrations to be deemed complete, new voters must not only sign an oath attesting to their citizenship, but also check a box that states the same. Unlike many counties, which have chosen to ignore the directive, Duval County chose to enforce it.

You see we've gone from literacy tests to more mundane forms of bureaucratic obstructionism and from White Citizens' Councils to Councils of Conservative Citizens.

To paraphrase H. Rap Brown, the disenfranchisement of Black voters is as American as cherry pie. Racist manipulations of voter registration and election outcomes is not just about stealing elections. It is about protecting unequal distributions of resources by directly thwarting Black participation in the political process and by barraging Blacks with different forms of the message that their participation is unimportant and inessential to the function of our society.

While I'm writing all of this, I'm thinking about a conversation that was going on in my yoga class last night when I walked in. My teacher, a wise, intellectual woman who is in her early sixties, was explaining that she never votes. I came in too late to catch her main point, but one of my fellow students was encouraging her to register before today's registration deadline in Massachusetts. He said that even here, where Kerry's victory is assured, it is important to vote. Otherwise we send the message that we don't care that much about what happens. Another student was saying how he wasn't going to vote because he plans to spend November 2 in New Hampshire, helping to get the vote out. Why not get an absentee ballot, the first student asked? Second student said going to New Hampshire is more important; it's a swing state.

As the deadlines for voter registration are starting to pass, I want to make a last plea that EVERYONE register and then go and vote—but not just because we need to do everything possible to get George W. Bush out of office. To readers who are white, like myself, I want to say this: when white Americans don't vote, we're saying that we take our power for granted. If we oppose George Bush, and if we oppose the interests of his racist base, we have to take opportunities to use our power as voters and to make clear demonstrations of where we stand. Otherwise we help broadcast our nation's constant message, the one that never has to be uttered out loud to be powerfully clear, that some members of our society deserve their rights and others don't.

-------
Images:
Map from Ronald C. Wimberley and Libby V. Morris, 1997, The Southern Black Belt: A National Perspective, Lexington: TVA Rural Studies Press, reprinted at http://sasw.chass.ncsu.edu/s&a/grad/ruralcom.htm.
Citizens' Council insignia from the back cover of a 1957 White Citizens' Council pamphlet, digitized at Middle Passage and African American History Museum.

Update 10/14: My wife wrote me to point out that I'd missed a transitional phrase in my last paragraph, which made it sound like I am writing only to whites. I've added a phrase for clarification, in boldface. Probably the whole paragraph could stand rewriting, but I hope the one phrase makes my meaning clear.

Promoting Access to Federal Programs

[from United States Commission on Civil Rights, Redefining Rights in America: The Civil Rights Record of the George W. Bush Administration, 2001–2004, Executive Summary, xii-xiv (pdf)]

By continuously improving access to federal programs, an administration can promote equal opportunity and reduce economic and social disparities. President Bush has made efforts to improve access, but as with past administrations, equal access remains elusive and requires greater federal investment.

Language Minorities: President Bush has indicated a commitment to improving access to federal programs for limited English proficient (LEP) individuals. Among the administration’s actions:

• DOJ issued a memorandum to federal agencies stating the Bush administration was committed to implementing a Clinton executive order to improve LEP access.

• The administration created the Federal LEP Interagency Working Group to improve efficiency and effectiveness of Title VI and executive order implementation, as well as the HERE Hispanic Initiative Grant Award to provide English instruction for immigrant workers and new American citizens.

• However, the administration has not required agencies to develop output measures or other assessments to evaluate progress. No procedures exist to assess whether federal programs and services are becoming more accessible to language minorities, hampering Title VI enforcement.

Underserved Minority Groups: President Bush extended several initiatives of earlier administrations designed to improve access for specific minority groups. Some assess a population’s general needs and develop solutions while others focus on a specific purpose. The administration modified each in some way. For example:

• President Bush extended the work of the President’s Advisory Commission on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (PACAAPI) until July 7, 2003. Before the group’s work could be completed, President Bush let the initiative’s renewal lapse. Almost a year later and after pleas from Congress and civil rights groups, he renewed it. However, the administration moved the initiative from the Department of Health and Human Services to the Department of Commerce and, without input from affected communities, changed its focus from broad appeal to a narrow one of economic and small business development. Advocacy groups criticized the changes, stating that they narrowed the mission and would result in neglect of pressing health problems.

• In 2001, the President also renewed the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanic Americans. He created an advisory commission and charged it with developing a multiyear action plan to close the achievement gap. The administration has developed a Web site to help parents and students make college decisions, and increased funding for Hispanic serving institutions. Overall, it developed many plans but undertook few actions and offers minimal demonstrable outcomes.

• In 2002, President Bush reestablished the President’s Board of Advisors on Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and extended the White House Initiative on HBCUs, a program to increase the participation of these institutions in federal grants and contracts. The board recommended that 27 participating agencies designate 10 percent of all money spent on higher education to HBCUs; only the Department of Education has met the goal. The board also is more than two years behind schedule in releasing annual performance reports, rendering a governmentwide evaluation of HBCU programs difficult.

Funding for Religious Groups: When President Bush took office, he expanded the ability of religious groups to receive federal funds through the Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. Although the initiative constitutes a retreat from civil rights, President Bush has consistently presented it as an extension of civil rights to religious groups.

• He advanced the plan as a flagship initiative, mentioning it in more than 350 speeches, issuing executive orders, directing federal agencies to revise regulations, and working with Congress to pass and strengthen related legislation.

• President Bush does not speak about civil rights initiatives often, but when he does he promotes the faith-based program more than any other. He has presented the initiative as an end to discrimination against religious organizations, using terms such as “remove barriers,” “equal access,” and “equal treatment,” which convey that such programs have civil rights relevance. In reality, the program does not remove barriers to discrimination. On the contrary, it allows religious organizations that receive public funds to discriminate against individuals based on religion in employment.