Voting-rights chief says remarks hurt

WASHINGTON - The chief of the U.S. Justice Department's voting rights section apologized to lawmakers for saying that laws requiring voters to show identification affect elderly whites more than blacks because members of minority groups "die first."

John Tanner told a House Judiciary subcommittee Tuesday that his comments were "hurtful" and "clumsy," though he stuck by his assertion that statistics show members of minority groups have a shorter life expectancy than whites.

The apology didn't mollify the panel's Democrats.

"It suggests to some of us that someone else can do this job better than you can," Rep. Artur Davis, D-Ala., told Tanner.

The subcommittee on the Constitution, civil rights and civil liberties is investigating whether political considerations played any role in work of Tanner's section, which is charged with enforcing laws that protect the rights of U.S.citizens to cast their ballots. Tanner, a career official, denied that his section's work was influenced by partisan politics.

In comments made earlier this month at a panel discussion in Los Angeles, Tanner said it's "a shame" that state laws requiring voters to have photo identification probably disadvantage older voters.

"Our society is such that minorities don't become elderly the way white people do. They die first," Tanner said, according to a video of his remarks. "Anything that disproportionately impacts the elderly has the opposite impact on minorities."

On Tuesday Tanner said he was sorry for his comments.

"I understand that my explanation of the data came across in a hurtful way, which I deeply regret," he said. "The reports of my comments do not in any way accurately reflect my career of devotion to enforcing federal laws designed to assure fair and equal access to the ballot."

Front Section, Pages 7 on 10/31/2007

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