Jim Hightower

Republican officials are having a major problem in their efforts to "ensure the integrity of the electoral process" by passing restrictive voter ID laws across the country. The problem is this: Their own effort is completely devoid of integrity.

The real electoral fraud being perpetrated in America is the GOP's frantic claim that hordes of ineligible people are voting illegally. It just isn't true. Indeed, despite all of their squawking, they've produced practically no cases of it happening anywhere. Nonetheless, they have produced a rash of show-me-your-papers voter ID requirements that are tainting the GOP with the sleazy legacy of voter suppression to pervert our nation's election results. To their chagrin the courts have been rejecting, setting aside, or weakening every one of their repressive laws that have been challenged this year, including those in Florida, Ohio, South Carolina, Texas, and Wisconsin.

However, their suppressionist claims might soon be validated by reports of a particularly scandalous outbreak of voter fraud in Colorado, Florida, and Nevada. Curiously, though, Republicans aren't jumping on this one. Perhaps that's because this fraud apparently has been committed by Nathan Sproul, one of their own top political operatives who's already been paid $3 million by the GOP for voter registration work this year in five states. Sproul, the former head of both the Arizona Republican Party and that State's Christian Coalition, is under investigation for – guess what? – tampering with the integrity of the electoral process. He and his company stand charged with putting false signatures and addresses on voter registration documents, registering dead people, and switching people's party affiliations.

The lesson here is, if you're going to fight for integrity, make sure you have some.