Colin Powell endorses OBama ( Archived) (292)

my mistake!

Well here's the the LA. Times story about the arrest of McCain's GOP....


Voters say they were duped into registering as Republicans

Stephen Osman / Los Angeles Times



"I am not a Republican," insisted Karen Ashcraft, 47, a pet-clinic manager and former Democrat from Ventura who said she was duped by a signature gatherer into joining the GOP. "I certainly . . . won't sign anything in front of a grocery store ever again."

It is a bait-and-switch scheme familiar to election experts. The firm hired by the California Republican Party -- a small company called Young Political Majors, or YPM, which operates in several states -- has been accused of using the tactic across the country.

Election officials and lawmakers have launched investigations into the activities of YPM workers in Florida and Massachusetts. In Arizona, the firm was recently a defendant in a civil rights lawsuit. Prosecutors in Los Angeles and Ventura counties say they are investigating complaints about the company.

The firm, which a Republican Party spokesman said is paid $7 to $12 for each registration it secures, has denied any wrongdoing and says it has never been charged with a crime.

The 70,000 voters YPM has registered for the Republican Party this year will help combat the public perception that it is struggling amid Democratic gains nationally, give a boost to fundraising efforts and bolster member support for party leaders, political strategists from both parties say.

Those who were formerly Democrats may stop receiving phone calls and literature from that party, perhaps affecting its get-out-the-vote efforts. They also will be given only a Republican ballot in the next primary election if they do not switch their registration back before then.

Some also report having their registration status changed to absentee without their permission; if they show up at the polls without a ballot they may be unable to vote.

The Times randomly interviewed 46 of the hundreds of voters whose election records show they were recently re-registered as Republicans by YPM, and 37 of them -- more than 80% -- said that they were misled into making the change or that it was done without their knowledge.

Lydia Laws, a Palm Springs retiree, said she was angry to find recently that her registration had been switched from Democrat to Republican.

Laws said the YPM staffer who instructed her to identify herself on a petition as a Republican assured her that it was a formality, and that her registration would not be changed. Later, a card showed up in the mail saying she had joined the GOP.

"I said, 'No, no, no. That's not right,' " Laws said.

It all sounds familiar to Beverly Hill, a Democrat and the former election supervisor in Florida's Alachua County. About 200 voters -- mostly college students -- were unwittingly registered as Republicans there in 2004 by YPM staffers using the same tactic, Hill said.

"It is just incredible that this can keep happening election after election," she said.

YPM and Republican Party officials said they were surprised by the complaints. The officials said the signature gatherers wear shirts bearing the Republican symbol, an elephant -- a contention disputed by some of the voters interviewed.

Every person registered signs an affidavit confirming they voluntarily joined the GOP, party leaders said.

"It does the state party no good to register people in a party they don't want to be in," said Hector Barajas, communications director for the California Republican Party.

The document that voters thought was an initiative petition has no legal implications at all. YPM founder Mark Jacoby said the petition was clearly labeled as a "plebiscite," which does nothing more than show public support.

(Cont'd)....

He also said that plainclothes investigators for Secretary of State Debra Bowen, a Democrat, have conducted multiple spot checks and told his firm it is doing nothing improper.

"Every time, they gave us a thumbs-up," Jacoby said. "People are not being tricked."

But Nicole Winger, a spokeswoman for the secretary of state's office, said the agency "does not give an OK or seal of approval to voter registration groups."

Two years ago, Orange County Dist. Atty. Tony Rackauckas charged 12 workers for a petitioning firm hired by the local Republican Party with fraudulently registering voters as Republican.

Democratic registration drives have also caught the attention of law enforcement officials.

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, a national nonprofit that recruits mostly Democratic voters, is being investigated by the FBI for filing fake registrations in multiple states during the current presidential campaign.

In April, eight ACORN officials in St. Louis pleaded guilty to federal election fraud for submitting false registration cards in 2006.

In California, signature-gatherers are prohibited by law from misleading voters about what they are signing.

"You can't lie to someone to procure their signature," said Richard L. Hasen, a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles who specializes in election law.

Civil rights activists recently filed a lawsuit in Arizona accusing YPM of deceiving residents to get signatures for a ballot measure that would have prohibited affirmative action by that state. The lawsuit was dropped after supporters of the measure pulled it from the ballot.

In Massachusetts, former YPM worker Angela McElroy testified at a legislative hearing in 2004that she had tricked voters into signing a ballot measure to ban gay marriage. She said she told voters they were signing in favor of a measure to allow alcoholic drinks to be sold in supermarkets.

YPM's Jacoby said McElroy was on loan to another signature-gathering company at the time the alleged deception took place.

Jose Aguilera, a 48-year-old math teacher from Ventura whose registration was recently changed from Democrat to Republican, said he signed the child-molester petition outside an Albertsons supermarket.

He said he was asked to sign a second document but not told that it would change his registration.

"Somehow the guy pulled out something else and I signed it," he said.

Ashcraft, the pet-clinic manager, said she knew that she could still vote in November for whichever presidential candidate she supports -- in her case, Democrat Barack Obama.

"I just don't like being lied to," she said.

Janett Lemaire, 54, said she told a signature-gatherer in the small Riverside County town of Desert Edge, "I've been a Democrat all my life and I want to stay that way."

But the man "said this has nothing to do with changing how you are registered," Lemaire said. "Then I get a notice in the mail saying I am a Republican. . . . I was very angry."

Yes, I saw this. It was the same thing the Huffington Post posted. There's nothing else and again I will say that if there were any substance to it, the pro Obama media would be in the midst of a McCain feeding frenzy.

Perhaps they've just been too busy reading the NY Times attack on Mrs. McCain and staking out Joe the Plumber a his house. Seriously, the media in this election is so blantantly biased.

Give them time, they'll catch up. The problem with most of the posters who are so into the ACORN thing is they don't care about voter fraud as much as beating a dead horse to discredit Obama.

I don't need everyone on my bandwagon liking Obama but just say you don't like him. Making a big deal out ACORN would logically lead to a big deal out of this too if it was actually about fraud wouldn't it? Isn't McCain discredited if this is true?

I would think that the Huffington Post got it...probably from the L.A. Times because if did happen in California so they would be the first to report it...and I had a news clip form MSNBC that said the same things...but I bookmarked it and then couldn't find the story because it went to the main MSNBC webpage and not the video of the news clip...so indeed the guy did get arrested and MSNBC basicly said the same things as this news story...


I don't know why the other press aren't on it...who knows...I think the guy was just arrested Saturday so maybe they just haven't got with the program yet....

I got the story right off the L.A. times website...Not the Huffington post website...

More W.Va. voters say machines are switching votes
In six cases, Democratic votes flipped to GOP


WINFIELD, W.Va. -- Three Putnam County voters say electronic voting machines changed their votes from Democrats to Republicans when they cast early ballots last week.

This is the second West Virginia county where voters have reported this problem. Last week, three voters in Jackson County told The Charleston Gazette their electronic vote for "Barack Obama" kept flipping to "John McCain".

In both counties, Republicans are responsible for overseeing elections. Both county clerks said the problem is isolated.

They also blamed voters for not being more careful.

"People make mistakes more than machines," said Jackson County Clerk Jeff Waybright.

Shelba Ketchum, a 69-year-old nurse retired from Thomas Memorial Hospital, described what happened Friday at the Putnam County Courthouse in Winfield.

"I pushed buttons and they all came up Republican," she said. "I hit Obama and it switched to McCain. I am really concerned about that. If McCain wins, there was something wrong with the machines.

"I asked them for a printout of my votes," Ketchum said. "But they said it was in the machine and I could not get it. I did not feel right when I left the courthouse. My son felt the same way.

"I heard from some other people they also had trouble. But no one in there knew how to fix it," said Ketchum, who is not related to Menis Ketchum, a Democratic Supreme Court candidate.

Ketchum's son, Chris, said he had the same problem. And Bobbi Oates of Scott Depot said her vote for incumbent Democratic Sen. John D. Rockefeller was switched to GOP opponent Jay Wolfe.

"I touched the one I wanted, Rockefeller, and the machine put a checkmark on the Republican instead," Oates said of her experience Thursday.

She said she caught the mistake, called over a worker in the county clerk's office and was able to correct her vote. But she worries other voters may not catch such a mistake.

When asked if she is sure she touched the box for Rockefeller, she said, "I'm absolutely positive."....

WOW...Here we go again...this is starting to sound familiar.....

Isn't it? The last 2 elections have been rife with accusations of voter fraud perpetuated by the Rep party. There has actually been proof of it, nothing was ever done.

I've been very angry about the manipulation of our voting system and the support of it. The lack of procecution and correction for this fraud is a direct result of this last administration benifiting from it I believe.