DOJ Voting Section alum to head Virginia elections

Don Palmer, another  distinguished alum of the DOJ Voting Section has been named the head of the Virginia State Board of Elections replacing Nancy Rodrigues.  Don is a strong advocate for military voters.  Governor McDonnnell deserves credit for this pick.


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


January 28, 2011


 


 


 


RICHMOND – Governor Bob McDonnell today announced an additional appointment to his administration in the Administration secretariat.  In addition, he announced appointments to two Virginia boards and commissions. 


 


A bio for today’s appointments can be found below.  Further announcements regarding additional appointments in the McDonnell Administration will continue to be made in the months ahead.


 


 


Administration


 


Donald Palmer, Secretary, State Board of Elections


Donald Palmer most recently served as the Director of Elections with the Florida Department of State, working with the Florida Secretary of State and 67 Supervisors of Elections in successful 2008 Primary and General Presidential Elections and the 2010 mid-term elections.  During his tenure, he improved statewide processes of statewide registration verification and list maintenance and he successfully implemented changes to align Florida with the federal Military and Overseas Voter Empowerment (MOVE) Act.


 


The Division of Elections consists of the Bureau of Election Records involved with the qualifying of candidates and receipt of campaign finance reports; the Bureau of Voting Systems Certification responsible for the testing and certification of voting systems entering the State of Florida; and the Bureau of Voter Registration Services implementing the federal statewide list maintenance mandates of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA). 


 


Donald Palmer represented Florida as a member of the EAC Standards Board of the United States Election Assistance Commission (EAC) and was elected to the Standards Executive Board by his peers.  He was also appointed by the EAC to the Technical Guidelines Development Committee (TGDC) to represent elections officials on the Standards Board.  These advisory boards provide recommendations to the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) on voluntary standards for voting equipment, voting systems, and voter registration databases. 


 


Prior to his tenure in Florida, he served as a trial attorney with the Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, Voting Section, where he enforced the federal voting laws and provided guidance to states on compliance with the civil rights laws.   In that role, he brought suits against jurisdictions for violations of the Voting Rights Act (VRA), the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) and the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).  He also monitored compliance with the Uniform and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act (UOCAVA).  


 


In May 2009, Donald Palmer provided testimony to the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration on the proposed Military Overseas Voter Empowerment (MOVE) Act eventually signed by President Obama, specifically highlighting Florida’s leading role in overcoming the obstacles military and overseas voters face in registration and voting. 


 


Donald Palmer is a reserve Navy Judge Advocate General (JAG) where he served in Naples, Italy, representing Sailors and Marines accused of military offenses.  He also served the Navy as an appellate counsel representing the Navy in the appeals of convictions of serious crimes.  Earlier in his career, he served as an Intelligence Officer with the now retired Sea Strike Squadron Twenty-Two of S-3bs and Carrier Air Wing Three (CVW-3) onboard “Big John”, the U.S.S. John F. Kennedy (CV-67). 


 


He still serves in the Navy Reserves in Jacksonville, Florida.  He is married and the father of three children.


 

New Black Panther report released by USCCR

The essentially final report of the United States Commission on Civil Rights about the New Black Panther dismissal is complete.  What does it say?  I’ll leave that to Jennifer Rubin’s summary at the Washington Post.  What is my reaction?  The report is large and thorough.  I was highly impressed by the writing of Commissioner Gail Heriot.  She provides compelling insight on a number of legal and factual issues that I believe nobody has yet provided including me.  I am particularly impressed with her writing as a writer, not just as a lawyer.  She commands the details of the subject as well as the broader implications of the matter.  The dissent seems to have undergone a retreat of sorts from some of their earlier bluster.  That is their right, and I would too given the circumstances.  On a number of occasions, the dissent make plainly false statements.  I’ll not catalog all of them here.  What I will catalog are some of the more interesting moments in the report, and reserve other opinions for those who ask:


 


This was news to me.  Given dozens of us know they are true, the sands fall into the bottom chamber.  From the report:


Michael Yaki, one of the investigation’s most vituperative critics, has publicly admitted that some of the allegations of racial favoritism we have uncovered, if true, are very disturbing. Specifically, he said that if the allegations against Deputy Assistant Attorney General Julie Fernandes are true, she should be fired.


  


Gail Heriot uncovers this tidbit about which I was not aware.  No surprise to me – but should be to the taxpayers paying the salary of this DOJ official:


“The law was written to protect black people.”  - Julie Fernades while employed by the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights and reported on page 132 of the report.


  


Chris is good at written statements.  I wasn’t particularly thrilled to be there in July:


Commissioner Yaki has insisted, of course, that Ms. Fernandes never made the  statements Adams attributed to her. Adams must be lying or he misunderstood the incidents he was reporting–or so Commissioner Yaki asked us to believe. But on September 24, 2010, Adams’ allegations were specifically corroborated by Christopher Coates, who, like Adams, was testifying under oath. Coates was able to furnish the Commission with a written statement, so his accusation was more elaborate than Adams’.


 


Professor Heriot writes:


Moreover, Adams and Coates testified that it was common for career attorneys at the Division to oppose the race neutral application of the law and that it was Bush administration attorneys who authorized the Brown case. Under the circumstances, it would hardly be shocking (or inappropriate) for a career attorney interesting in applying the law neutrally to prefer to take his chances with the outgoing  administration rather than the incoming one. The evidence thus far indicates that events have unfolded in a way that would vindicate that judgment, if indeed such a judgment was made.


 


On the case cited by AAG Tom Perez on default judgment requirements.  Ooops.


Shields v. Zuccarini, 254 F.3d 476 (3d Cir. 2001), is not even a default case, so it is not clear why it was cited.


 


Heriot’s pen is mighty:


Few Americans can tell you exactly what members of the Italian Black Brigades wore, just as few can tell you exactly whether an organization like the Black Beret Cadre of Bermuda even existed. But that doesn’t mean they will look at two men wearing black berets, military-style boots, New Black Panther Party insignia, black pants, shirts and jacket and a night stick and not realize that they are looking at menacing thugs emulating the dress of paramilitary and similar organizations of the past. Americans are not fools. No one mistook King Samir Shabazz and Jerry Jackson for a pair of existential philosophers on their way to sip coffee at a sidewalk café in Paris.


 


This is just one of many vile evil statements by the founder of the NBPP:


Khalid Abdul Muhammad, national chairman of the New Black Panther Party until his death in 2001 and considered by some to be the father of the movement, once told a cheering crowd: I said if we’re going to be merciful we give ‘em [whites] 24 hours in South Africa to get out of town by sundown. I said if they don’t get out of town; we kill the men; we kill the women; we kill the children; we kill the babies; we kill the blind; we kill the cripple; we kill the crazy; we kill the faggots; we kill the lesbians; I said goddamnit, we kill ‘em all.


 


Michael Yaki falsehood:


Communications between J. Christian Adams and Republican operatives reveal that, less than two weeks before the creation of the J Memo, the trial could not establish even a basic outline of the events that took in Philadelphia. (Nonsense, this pertained to identifying who a certain poll watcher was.  The “basic outline of events” was well known).


 


Error in Yaki footnote 83


We find it noteworthy that, as with other statements made by AAG Perez, the Report completely fails to mention the fact that the relief was extended. Rather, the Report claims that AAG Perez’s statements about this highly-relevant topic were merely generalized and often non-responsive. This assertion is pure fallacy.  (Error – nothing whatsoever was “extended.”  That motion has not been granted.)


 


Error throughout Yaki dissent, and footnote 64:


“ . . . Mr. Adams’s use of ‘deploy’ is puzzling. Mr. Adams seems to use deploy in its proper way, as an action that a commander (in his imagining, Malik Zulu Shabazz) performs on their troops.”


(A jmemo is signed by multiple parties as author, not one party as Mr. Yaki implies.)


 


Wow! How does Michael Yaki know this; what DOJ official would dare say ideology drove their hostility to the case.  Actually, this isn’t a hard question to answer:


Lastly, due to the extraordinary politicization of the Civil Rights Division during the Bush Administration, the long-time veteran career staff who were the acting-heads of the Division were properly suspicious of those hired or promoted during that period of politicization.


 


To the boats! Commissioner Yaki spies his white whale on page 197:


“as opposed to being simply ‘true members’ of the von Spakovsky/Schlozman Team.”

Of course there are other errors by Commissioner Yaki, but I’ll leave that to some good reporters to find. 

PJ Tatler – Bypass DOJ on Voter ID bills

Latest at Tatler.   A portion:


Bills requiring photo identification at the polls are progressing in several states, including Texas, Mississippi and the Carolinas.  These states would be making a huge mistake if they submitted voter identification laws to the Holder Justice Department for preclearance.  Their attorneys general should go straight to federal district court in the District of Columbia, as is their right, and bypass the bureaucrats deep in the bowels of the Justice Department – at least if they want their voter identification laws to take effect.