On the day that former Obama lieutenant Artur Davis is set to give his big speech at the Republican National Convention making his defection from President Obama official, Davis got a “Dear Artur”letter from 14 members of the Congressional Black Caucus, blasting his “unconscionable” support now for voter ID laws.
In the letter, the member of Congress belittle Davis’ motives for being a turncoat, saying “your actions are the result of a nakedly personal and political calculation or simmering anguish” for not winning the Democratic nomination for the Alabama governorship in 2010. But the letter writers reserved their angriest language for Davis’ flip flop on voter ID laws.
“It’s unconscionable that you now claim Voter ID laws do not violate civil rights or suppress minority voter turnout,” said the letter, whose signers include such CBC leaders as Reps. Emanuel Cleaver of Missouri, Barbara Lee of California, John Conyers of Michigan, Greg Meeks of New York and James Clyburn of South Carolina.
“Yet in 2007 while still representing Alabama’s 7th congressional district, you joined then-Senator Obama in calling for the resignation of the Justice Department’s Voting Rights chief after he claimed that Voter ID laws did not hurt minorities, saying, ‘you can’t argue that voter ID laws don’t disfranchise African-Americans.'”
The letter goes on to list a number of the progressive positions and statements of Davis’ over the years, including the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the Wall Street reform bill, the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, and ending tax subsidies for oil companies.
“It is important that the American people have their own facts and draw their own conclusions about your true motivations for speaking at the Republican National Convention tonight,” the letter concluded.
Clearly the letter is intended to upstage Davis’ speech at the convention, to give commentators some language to use while Davis steps out before the crowd.
