Here’s a letter the DPVA just sent out from Obama’s Attorney General Eric Holder, a national champion for fair redistricting, on the importance of our voter protection efforts in Virginia. Please sign up here.
As President Johnson said when he signed the Voting Rights Act, “The right to vote is the basic right without which all others are meaningless.” Fifty years after the passage of that Act, the right to vote is under siege again.
We need your help to ensure that every eligible voter in the Commonwealth has the chance to cast his or her ballot and get it counted. That is why I am asking you to join the Virginia Voter Protection Team as a poll observer. In this role, you will play a critical role helping Virginia’s voters by making sure that nobody with a valid ID is turned away, that no voter is intimidated, and that election officials are correctly interpreting and applying Virginia’s election laws. Volunteers need not be lawyers or election law experts — training and written materials providing information to commonly asked voting questions will be provided before you are assigned to a polling location.
Will you volunteer this year to make sure everyone who wants to vote is able to?
As you know, there’s a movement in America, and in Virginia, to make it difficult for people to exercise their right to vote or make it so their vote is diminished through gerrymandering. This election will not only determine the leadership in Virginia, it will also have repercussions on the makeup of the Congressional maps that are drawn after the 2020 Census. Virginia was badly gerrymandered by Republicans following the 2010 Census and we can’t allow that to happen again. Therefore, we must use our best efforts to ensure that this most essential of American rights, the right to vote, is protected for this election and protected for future generations.
Making sure every single vote counts is a crucial part of our strategy — can I count on you to help?
Thank you,
Eric H. Holder, Jr.
82nd Attorney General of the United States