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The GOP and Voter FraudHow does the Republican National Committee know it's Democrats who are registering dead people in Bernalillo County, N.M.?

ByTimothy Noah
Posted Wednesday, Oct. 27, 2004, at 5:31 PM ET

How does the Republican National Committee know that attempts to register dead people in Bernalillo County, N.M., (pop. 581,000) belong under the rubric, "Democratic Voter Fraud Watch"? The county, which includes Albuquerque, went for Gore/Lieberman in 2000. That would suggest that it's Republicans who bear the more plausible motive to cheat this time out. Really, though, it's impossible to know who's responsible for this monkey business. Why is the RNC blaming Democrats?

I see two possibilities. One is that the RNC plans to blame, indiscriminately, every instance of voter fraud on the Democrats. The other is that the RNC knows the Democrats did this one because the RNC is directing its own election-fraud efforts around the country from Washington—no freelancers, please!—and the Bernalillo County job isn't one of these.

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Timothy Noah is a senior writer at Slate.
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