UPDATE: Virginia politicians use lies to scare Democrat-leaning Virginia Tech students away from voting

Update: A reader sez,

I can tell you firsthand that no Republican officials that I know of have been involved in this situation.

There are certainly partisan undertones around this story however, considering the Obama campaign has much to gain from a large registration effort at Va. Tech. But any facts supporting the idea that Republicans were behind the misinformation distributed by the county where Virginia Tech is located have not emerged.

You can read the original story here

You might also be interested in this subsequent story, which points out that the campus and surrounding area is divided into no fewer than five precincts, and the main polling place for the area where most dorms are located is four miles from the campus and inaccessible by public transportation.

From Jon Taplin's blog: "Late last month local Virginia Republican officials began to worry about the thousands of students at Virginia Tech who were being registered by the Obama Campaign. So they put out a series of press releases incorrectly asserting dire consequences for the students."

The releases warned that such students could no longer be claimed as dependents on their parents' tax returns, a statement the Internal Revenue Service says is incorrect, and could lose scholarships or coverage under their parents' car and health insurance.

Stopping Students From Voting