Kerry Suggests Rivals Might Suppress Black Votes

Senator John Kerry suggested on Saturday that Republicans might be trying to suppress black votes in key electoral battlegrounds, pledging to an audience of the capital's black elite to make sure that "every vote is counted and every vote counts." "We are not going to stand by and allow another million African-American votes to go uncounted in this election," Mr. Kerry, the Democratic presidential nominee, told some 3,000 people at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation's annual gala at the Washington Convention Center. "We are not going to stand by and allow acts of voter suppression.'' Drawing the only standing ovation of his 35-minute speech, he said: "We are hearing those things already. What they did in Florida in 2000, some say they may be planning to do this year in battleground states all across this country." [more ]