MSNBC "Hardball with Chris Matthews" - Transcript: Voting
Interview
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Joining right now is U.S. Congressman Joaquin Castro of Texas, and a Ryan Haywood -- Haygood, rather, of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund.Congressman, tell me about what you think the impact in Texas is of all this voter suppression effort by the Republicans?
REP. JOAQUIN CASTRO (D), TEXAS: Well, first of all, I think yesterday`s ruling by Judge Ramos is a real victory for democracy because this was a clear attempt by the Republican legislature to shave off at the margins the number of people who vote in Texas.
And they did it not only by voter ID, but also by making it harder to go in and register people to vote, setting up rules about mail-in ballots. They`re looking at cutting early voting in the 2015 legislative session. And so I`m glad to see that she made that ruling, and I hope that it`s going to be upheld by the fifth circuit, and if necessary, by the Supreme Court.
MATTHEWS: Do the Republicans that you get to talk to down there -- do they make any bones about it? Do they pretend this is to prevent cheating? They never seem to come up with examples of cheating that justify these laws. Do they say that to you (INAUDIBLE) this is just to make it cleaner? What do they say when you catch them?
CASTRO: Yes, I mean, I think that`s right, you know? People have deluded themselves into believing that there was a real problem with voter fraud. And then when they went to court, they scrambled very hard, but for the most part were unable to find any kind of widespread voter fraud.
And the problem that we have in this country, Chris, is not that too many people vote, it`s that not enough people vote. We have to get more people to go out and vote, and these efforts have been very harmful.
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MATTHEWS: Congressman Castro, thanks for joining us.
And I just wonder, is this an attempt broadly by the Republican Party, which has had a hard time recruiting people of color to its party, whether Hispanic people or African-Americans or any group that is not white? Is this an attempt to deal with the declining proportion of the country, of the electoral base which is white by making it harder for people who are not to vote? Is this what`s going on here?
CASTRO: Well, I think part of it is trying to shave off, you know, 2 or 3 or 4 percentage points of people that do vote and who tend to vote Democratic.
And, Chris, you know how many elections that you can win if you can shave off three or four points. And we should also note that, in 2011, the Texas legislature also passed a redistricting plan that a federal court also said intentionally, intentionally discriminated against minorities. And so the 2011 session is historic in terms of the bad legislation that`s come out of Texas. And it certainly was no accident.
MATTHEWS: That was Tom DeLay`s work, right?
CASTRO: Oh, absolutely. Tom DeLay spearheaded it. We had the re- redistricting in 2003, my first session in the legislature, and they have basically kept it up since then.
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