Conned

"Why have four million Americans - mainly poor, black, and Latino - lost the right to vote? Why, in some states, are a third of all African American men excluded from the democratic process? Conned is the story of the millions of Americans being robbed of voting rights in an era of mass incarceration by felony disenfranchisement laws, laws that deny the vote to felons while they are in prison, on parole, or on probation - and, in several states, that continue to disenfranchise them for the rest of their lives." "In this book, award-winning journalist Sasha Abramsky journeys through America, interviewing ex-prisoners, politicians, and voting rights activists. Traveling from the Pacific Northwest to Miami, with a dozen stops along the way, he details the renaissance of anti-democratic laws that came of age in the post-Civil War segregationist South, but which are now more destructive than ever. Conned reveals for the first time the impact of these laws on elections nationwide - from state legislative races in Iowa to a governor's race in Alabama, all the way up to the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections. Indeed, felony disenfranchisement now plays a central role in American political life, and has become a fundamental threat to American democracy."--BOOK JACKET.

Sasha Abramsky teaches in the writing program at the University of California, Davis.