Virginia republican party man arrested after destroying registration forms.

[J. J.]

I'd doubt this is suppression, since they don't have party registration in VA.  I'd also question if he any obligation to turn them in. 

[J. J.]

I'd doubt this is suppression, since they don't have party registration in VA.  I'd also question if he any obligation to turn them in.  

Wow you are totally shameless.

No, but unless the guy was a letter carrier or a a public official, he had no obligation to deliver them.  Simply put, it is not legal to draft people into the US Postal Service.

[J. J.]

I'd doubt this is suppression, since they don't have party registration in VA.

Of course it's suppression.  It doesn't matter whose forms he was throwing away.  Also, why would you conduct a voter registration drive only to throw the forms away?  Unless these forms were somehow moot or requested by the voter to be destroyed, this is suppression, period.  Also, any half-competent registrar would get a written record from the voter if they were destroying a completed form.  I do -- every single time -- because otherwise you can't disprove that you were violating state law without the voters' testimony.  What competent person would risk that, and why?

As to why, because they were duplicates, or at least he thought most of them were.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/worker-for-gop-hired-contractor-charged-with-dumping-va-voter-registration-forms/2012/10/19/86062d7a-19f1-11e2-ad4a-e5a958b60a1e_story.html

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Virginia, like every state in the union that I know of (besides North Dakota), legally mandates that completed voter registrations must be returned.  Not doing so is a crime.  How do you think someone could be charged with "four counts of destruction of voter registration forms" if there's no legal obligation?
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Only if the person is a hired third party, which he was.  If someone hands you a voter registration form, and you are not an official (or a letter carrier), you have no obligation to do anything with it.

[J. J.]

So J. J.'s argument ultimately appears to be "There is nothing wrong with this because if you give your voter registration form to a random person on the street they are not obligated to deliver it. Even though this incident did not involve that."

Well, I don't have an obligation, as a private citizen to mail anything for someone else.  This was a bit different because he agreed, presumably, to mail them.

It is obviously different if the person is an official and has a duty to mail them; I'll concede that he might have. 

Also, most of the forms were duplicates of people already registered, so I would not call those voter suppression.

[J. J.]

So J. J.'s argument ultimately appears to be "There is nothing wrong with this because if you give your voter registration form to a random person on the street they are not obligated to deliver it. Even though this incident did not involve that."

Well, I don't have an obligation, as a private citizen to mail anything for someone else.  This was a bit different because he agreed, presumably, to mail them.

It is obviously different if the person is an official and has a duty to mail them; I'll concede that he might have. 

Which means your example of a private citizen having to mail them is entirely pointless and completely irrelevant to this situation.

Also, most of the forms were duplicates of people already registered, so I would not call those voter suppression.

1. It is not illegal to submit a duplicate voter registration, nor uncommon.
2. Since we have the actual reason he threw them away why are you still continuing on this line anyway?

Well, in the first place, because it wasn't clear to me he was hired first.

It isn't voter suppression, or voter fraud, not to register someone who is already registered (unless it was a change of data).

The reason was, he made a mistake.  That isn't voter suppression either.