Dear editor:

I attended the video “Suppressed and Sabotaged: The Fight to Vote” on Thursday, May 9 held at Northwest College that was put out by BraveNewFilms.org. The video addressed voting issues in other states, not Wyoming. The film screening was put on by Wyoming Rising.

One thing that really stood out to me was the fact that this documentary was trying to address voter suppression in particular states but then threw in pictures of Jan. 6 with people in military gear with guns and covered faces and black and white videos from the civil rights movement. They were scary images. A few of the attendees stated those could actually turn people away from voting. If voters thought that they were going to have to deal with that at the polls, wouldn’t they be discouraged from voting? I didn’t feel that question was addressed. This is also a propaganda method. Its goal is to hype people up so that they become fear induced, angry activists ready and willing to fight injustice. Those images were not pertinent to the states or issues in the video, so the only reason they were added was to stir up emotions. Everyone agrees that voter suppression is bad. We all want to do all we can to prevent that from happening.

In the video, Stacey Abrams alleged that Secretary of State Brian Kemp suppressed the vote during her bid against him for governor of Georgia. The USA Today story, “Georgia Democrat Abrams Charges GOP opponent Kemp Is Trying to Suppress Vote of Women, Minorities,” says “Voters will be allowed to cast ballots if they show photo ID that substantially matches the registration application.” It also states that “Abrams charged that voters will have to go through unnecessary hurdles …” I think women and people of color are up to that. It reminds me of a video where black people in East Harlem were offended when asked if they were able to get IDs to vote. They knew where the DMV was located, could get there, most already had driver’s licenses and thought it was ludicrous that white people thought they couldn’t get IDs. They said it was ignorant and racist.

During Q&A after the video, the video’s director told one gentleman that the gentleman’s “facts” were really “opinions” and then went on to say that only one or two out of thousands of votes were fraudulent but that thousands of votes were suppressed. When asked for the sources of his info, another attendee was directed to the BNF website. Could someone let me know where the fact sheet is because I haven’t been able to find it? I found it curious that the director’s “facts” aren’t given so they aren’t provable but the gentleman above was told that the pictures he’d seen of Colorado license plates at voting places in Laramie County were only his opinion. I think we no longer understand what facts and opinions are. Facts are concrete, provable evidence; opinions are not. Someone brought up the differences between the “facts” presented in this video and the “facts” presented in the “2000 Mules” video. One difference is that this video had a lot of people telling their experiences and the reasons they thought they had those experiences, all unprovable; as compared to the “2000 Mules” camera footage of people putting large batches of ballots into drop boxes, many on multiple occasions — verifiable facts.

There are a lot of lies nowadays. Remember, always look at facts, not opinions. Be slow to believe what you hear, don’t follow the crowd, and be open to change your mind if someone gives you new evidence.

Dona Becker

Powell