Electoral fraud

Electoral fraud is illegal interference with the process of an election.

Media involvement
On December 9, 2003, Congressman Dennis Kucinich publicly stood up to big media on a nationally televised debate. Dennis told debate moderator Ted Koppel, "I want the American people to see where media takes politics in this country." The crowd cheered. "We start talking about endorsements, now we're talking about polls and then talking about money. When you do that you don't have to talk about what's important to the American people."  On December 10, ABC News pulled its fulltime embedded reporter from her job of traveling daily with the campaign, a move that it was at first suggested could entail postponing an in-depth interview of the candidate that had been planned for the next week in Iowa. 

At issue here is whether the media will usurp the role of the people in narrowing the field of candidates. The airwaves belong to the people. The people of this country are increasingly turned off by politics and disinclined to vote. Biased and superficial coverage leaves people thinking that their vote does not matter and that they have nothing to vote for.

Related SourceWatch Resources

 * Bush administration U.S. attorney firings controversy
 * Bush administration phony 'voter fraud'
 * Election Center
 * e-voting
 * e-voting PR
 * gerrymandering
 * U.S. presidential election, 2004
 * Undermining elections
 * Voting Rights Act of 1965

General

 * electoral fraud in the Wikipedia.
 * Thom Hartmann, Archived articles on Democracy.

2003

 * Paul Krugman, Hack the Vote, New York Times Op-Ed, December 2, 2003: "Inviting Bush supporters to a fund-raiser, the host wrote, 'I am committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year.' No surprise there. But Walden O'Dell -- who says that he wasn't talking about his business operations -- happens to be the chief executive of Diebold Inc., whose touch-screen voting machines are in increasingly widespread use across the United States."
 * George Bennett, Florida won't require printouts of touch-screen votes, Palm Beach Post, December 8, 2003.

2007
See Bush administration phony 'voter fraud'