“It is unfortunate that a court of appeals has permitted the Republican Party to continue its plan to challenge voters on Election Day, but we were prepared for this outcome.”

— Ohio Democratic Party Spokesman David Sullivan, in response to today’s ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit of Cincinnati, which will allow the Republican Party to place thousands of monitors inside polling stations in Ohio to challenge the eligibility of certain individuals to vote.

The G.O.P. now has the official sanction of the courts to send a small army of 3,500 monitors to polling stations around Ohio, where they will question the eligibility of voters. Democrats allege that this Republican challenge to voter eligibility is an intimidation tactic against minority voters. Republicans insist that they are merely protecting the democratic process against voter fraud.

In a lower court ruling, Judge Susan J. Dlott and Judge John R. Adams both asserted that there are already measures in place to prevent voter fraud. If we are to believe the dissenting voices, this Republican victory is, at very best, excessive and, at worst, a sanctioned form of disenfranchisement.

Mimi Hanaoka