This week in the War on Voting: Iowa secretary of state purges voters with self-vetted rules

Matt Schultz (Gage Skidmore) Iowa Secretary of State Matt Schultz, a Republican, has written himself some rules designed to purge voters from the rolls. The American Civil Liberties Union and League of United Latin American Citizens have filed for an injunction, calling the rules illegal.

By some secret means known only to it, Schultz's office can now, based on rules only it has vetted, determine whether someone ineligible, say a non-citizen, has registered. The office is sending letters to these voters which say they have 14 days to dispute the state's claim and prove they are eligible to vote or face removal from the state list. And possible prosecution. At this time of year especially, such voters could simply be on vacation.

The second rule allows anyone to claim voter fraud without swearing to their accuracy. That, says Ben Stone, the chief of the ACLU-Iowa, is against state law. But that apparently makes no never mind to Schultz.

Schultz has also brought in an agent from the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation to look into voter fraud. County auditors, who run local elections, were surprised and some quite taken aback by the announcement. And not just Democrats. For instance, Ken Kline, a Republican auditor in Cerro Gordo County, said he had many questions about what the DCI agent will look at since many cases are simply data errors.

"I wish we had better communication as to what databases were compared, what were the procedures, what were the parameters, the controls," he said. "We do a lot of that in this office and you have to be very careful, especially with something of this volatile of a nature."

(For more of this week's news, continue reading below the fold.)