Virtual Blackout From National Media on Voter
Suppression in Florida

By Adam Peck 
ThinkProgress 
May 30, 2012

http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2012/05/29/491805/rick-scott-voter-purge-national-media/?mobile=nc

Florida Governor Rick Scott (R) has directed his
administration to purge the state's voting rolls of
thousands of registered voters prior to the November
election. But his list, which purports to include only
"non-citizens," targets mostly Democrats and Hispanics
and, as ThinkProgress has documented, may
disenfranchise hundreds of citizens who are eligible to
vote.

The story of a sitting governor of a state with a
history of presidential election shenanigans knowingly
purging his own, eligible constituents from the voter
rolls is the definition of major news, and yet
remarkably, in the first five months of the year, The
Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal and USA Today
have published a total of zero articles about Scott's
actions. The New York Times did slightly better,
printing one story on page 16 of the Friday, May 18th
edition. The article ran under the credulous headline:
"Florida Steps Up Effort Against Illegal Voters."

Florida's local newspapers, led by The Miami Herald,
have been far more diligent in reporting the governor's
effort to disenfranchise eligible voters. While it may
be easy to dismiss this as local fare, the implications
of Scott's purge could potentially swing the
presidential election come November. Remember, months
before anyone had ever heard of hanging chads, Florida
Secretary of State Katherine Harris (R) conducted a
similar cleansing of the voter rolls in 2000, which
resulted in thousands of eligible voters being knocked
off the rolls in time for the infamous Gore v. Bush
election.
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