Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire
  • omnibus

Georgia Governor Kemp Loses Vote Purge Suit Brought by Reporter Palast 
Nicole Powers
12 Feb 2020
🖨️ Print Article
Georgia Governor Kemp Loses Vote Purge Suit Brought by Reporter Palast 
Georgia Governor Kemp Loses Vote Purge Suit Brought by Reporter Palast 

The judge ruled that Kemp’s defense was so weak that no trial is needed.

“The evidence is overwhelming that Kemp used the Crosscheck list in some way to purge Georgians.”

In an extraordinary and unexpected move, Federal Judge Eleanor Ross has declared Gov. Brian Kemp the loser in a lawsuit brought by investigative journalist Greg Palast to compel the State of Georgia to open up its complete files on the mass purge of over half a million voters from the rolls.

Surprising all parties, the judge ruled that Kemp’s defense was so weak that no trial is needed. The judge acted “sua sponte” — on her own initiative, unrequested by Palast’s attorneys.

Palast has been fighting Kemp to release his hidden purge lists and methods for six years, for Rolling Stone, Aljazeera, Salon, Democracy Now and currently, The Guardian.

Palast said, “Kemp and the new Sec. of State of Georgia want to keep the lid on their methods for removing literally hundreds of thousands of low-income, young and minority voters on the basis of false information. They cannot hide any more. This is a huge win and precedent for reporters trying to pry information from the hands of guilty officials.”

A key issue at stake are the “Interstate Crosscheck” purge lists secretly provided to Georgia by the Kansas Secretary of State in 2015 and 2017. Kemp had turned over Georgia’s voter rolls to Kansas official Kris Kobach, who worked closely with Donald Trump, and is known for his racially biased vote suppression techniques.

“This is a huge win and precedent for reporters trying to pry information from the hands of guilty officials.”

“Kemp tried to hide the Crosscheck lists which he got from his crony Kobach. The lists are at least 99.9% wrong. Kemp’s office claimed he did not use the lists to purge voters, an assertion contradicted by his GOP predecessor. Moreover, Zach D. Roberts of the Palast investigative team obtained the Georgia 2013 purge list provided by Kobach through (legal) investigative techniques — so we know, and the judge knows, he has more squirreled away.

“Kemp finally turned over evidence that he purged 106,000 voters, overwhelmingly voters of color, that were on the Crosscheck list. But that’s just the tip of the purge-berg.”

Palast’s co-plaintiff Helen Butler is the Executive Director of the Georgia Coalition for the Peoples Agenda, a non-partisan group founded by civil rights legend Rev. Joseph Lowery. Lowery, commenting on the Crosscheck purge system, told Palast, “It’s Jim Crow all over again.”

Oddly, one of Kemp’s defenses was that he turned over Georgia’s confidential voter information to Kobach so it could be used to purge voters in 29 other states, but not Georgia. Kobach’s list showed thousands of Michigan voters who’d supposedly also registered or voted in Georgia. Michigan removed tens of thousands of voters with names like “James Brown” and “Mohammed Mohammed” — almost all with mismatched middle names.

“It’s Jim Crow all over again.”

The Michigan purge of Georgia voters was key to Trump’s official victory margin of 10,700 in Michigan, putting Trump over the top in the electoral college.

While Palast says, “The evidence is overwhelming that Kemp used the Crosscheck list in some way to purge Georgians — 106,000 is not a ‘coincidence’ — I do want to find out why Kemp was using Georgia voter rolls to remove voters in other states.”

The Crosscheck list identifies over half a million Georgians — including one in seven African-Americans in the state — as having moved out of Georgia, according to an investigative report on Kemp and Kobach published by Palast in Rolling Stone in 2016.

“My job as an investigative journalist is not to change laws or affect elections, but to expose official shenanigans. I thank my lawyers Brian Spears of Atlanta and Jeanne Mirer of New York for taking this case pro bono to rip the cover off Kemp’s and the state of Georgia’s racially poisonous undermining of democracy.”

View Judge Eleanor Ross’ Greg Palast and Helen Butler v. Brian Kemp court order here.

Nicole Powers writes for The Palast Investigative Fund.

COMMENTS?

Please join the conversation on Black Agenda Report's Facebook page at http://facebook.com/blackagendareport

Or, you can comment by emailing us at comments@blackagendareport.com

Black Voter Suppression

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


Related Stories

Who’s Hacking Who? Americans, Not Russians, Disenfranchise Millions of Blacks
Bryan K. Bullock
Who’s Hacking Who? Americans, Not Russians, Disenfranchise Millions of Blacks
11 October 2017
“The black vote has been ‘hacked’ and ‘i

More Stories


  • Isaias Afwerki
    Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    Isaias Afwerki: My Struggle for Eritrea and Africa
    13 Aug 2025
    Michel Collon has interviewed Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki and says the world must listen to him.
  • Jon Jeter
    Black People Who See Themselves in Palestinians Find that Israel Sees the Same
    13 Aug 2025
    Israel's brutal treatment of Black solidarity activists proves the truth that resistance to settler colonialism comes with a price. For Black Americans standing with Palestine, that price has always…
  • Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    For a young labor leader leading by example
    13 Aug 2025
    "For a young labor leader leading by example" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence.
  • Black Alliance For Peace
    End the Colonial Occupation of Washington D.C.: The People Demand Self-Determination and Self-Governance
    13 Aug 2025
    Washington, D.C.'s political subjugation exposes America's democratic facade. While claiming to champion self-rule globally, the U.S. increases repression and lays siege on the residents of its own…
  • Matteo Capasso
    The Unraveling: America Against America in the Post-Liberal Moment
    13 Aug 2025
    Fukuyama's 'end of history' was just an excuse for empire that Wang Huning saw through back in 1991. Now, as America's broken system tears itself apart, our job isn't to save it, but to build…
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us