INTERVIEW – HANS VON SPAKOVSKY – –  A former counsel to the assistant attorney general for civil rights in the Justice Department, former commissioner for the Federal Election Commission from 2006 to 2007 and senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation

• Voter registration soaring:

• Voter registration soaring in Virginia. Voter registration has surged this year across Virginia compared to the white-hot 2012 presidential election — and some Peninsula communities are outpacing the state’s double-digit increase, state Elections Department data show.
• Data Disproves Trump’s Appeal to New Voters: Many states have seen higher turnout during the primary race, but the GOP front-runner isn’t bringing first-time voters to the polls.   new analysis by Politico of voting statistics in states such as Iowa, South Carolina, Florida and Ohio, all of which saw big bumps in turnout this year, essentially disproves Trump’s claim. In Iowa, participation in the Feb. 1 caucuses leaped 50 percent, but nearly all of those attending – 95 percent – had voted in at least one of the previous four presidential elections, while 80 percent had voted in at least three out of the four presidential contests since 2000.
• Hispanic voter registration is climbing in some states. Is it because of Donald Trump?   In a traditional election year, a 65% growth from the same period of last year would be remarkable. But this year we are seeing a doubling of registration growth among Latinos, and a more than 150% increase for some young voters, and a near-tripling for Democrats. The number of new Democrats registering was up 185 percent compared with the first three months of 2012. The number of voters aged 23 to 30 was up 161 percent. And, perhaps most significantly, the number of Hispanics registering was up 98 percent. There have been a number of anecdotal reports of Hispanics seeking to become naturalized citizens in order to register to vote — and then vote against Donald Trump. The Houston Chronicle looked at this last week, finding that citizenship applications were up 15 percent between August and January compared to the year prior. There’s also a big push by Univision to get Hispanics registered to vote, with the aim of getting 3 million new voters registered.