In a lawsuit filed against the Republican Party in Florida, former chairman Jim Greer said that party officials discussed ways in which they could prevent blacks from voting, the Tampa Bay Times reports.
Greer alleged that party officials, some of whom he called "whack-a-do's," discussed suppressing the black vote in a December 2009 meeting.
"I was upset because the political consultants and staff were talking about voter suppression and keeping blacks from voting. It had been one of those days,'' he said. Greer also said that the party wanted to oust former governor Charlie Crist, a Republican, in part because Crist appointed a liberal black judge to the state's Supreme Court.
Greer, however, has an axe to grind: he is facing corruption charges on six felonies, including money laundering and grand theft stemming from allegations that he ran a shell company that improperly funneled party money to him.
Gov. Rick Scott of Florida, a Republican, has endorsed a voter I.D. law in the state, as well as a purge that its supporters say is meant to keep non-citizens from illegally casting a ballot. But critics say that voter fraud almost never happens, that disproportionate numbers of the people purged are Democrats or Hispanics who are legally eligible to vote, and that the purge does not leave them sufficient time to re-register in the event that they were accidentally kicked off the voter rolls.
Earlier this week, Crist said that Rick Scott, who succeeded him as governor, called the state's voter I.D. laws and its controversial voter purge "unconscionable."
“The concern really is on sort of a closing the door on democracy,” Crist told MSNBC on Wednesday.