Firing prosecutors
It appears that under Rove’s direction the White House has been planning to use US attorneys to fan national fears of voter fraud. In his speech to the GOP lawyers, Rove listed 11 states that would play a pivotal role in the 2008 elections. Since 2005, Bush has appointed new US attorneys in nine of those states: Florida, Colorado, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Michigan, Nevada, Arkansas, and New Mexico.
What’s more, the firings of US attorneys in New Mexico, Arkansas, and Washington appear directly related to this Republican plan to exploit the issue of voter fraud and suppress Democratic turnout.
In Arkansas, Bush fired a sitting US attorney in order to appoint Rove protege Tim Griffin.
In Washington, fired US Attorney John McKay had refused to prosecute alleged voter fraud in the 2004 Washington governor’s race, in which Democrat Chris Gregoire beat Republican Dino Rossi by 129 votes.
On March 6, McKay testified before the Senate that after the election Republicans pressured him to open an investigation. He said his office had examined the allegations of voter fraud and decided there was not enough evidence to pursue a case.
“Had anyone at the Justice Department or the White House ordered me to pursue any matter criminally in the 2004 governor’s election, I would have resigned,” McKay told the Seattle Times. “There was no evidence, and I am not going to drag innocent people in front of a grand jury.”
In New Mexico, David C. Iglesias was equally suspect in the eyes of the GOP. Recall that in 2000, Gore beat Bush by 377 votes in New Mexico. Consequently, in 2004, Democrat-affiliated groups initiated voter registration campaigns in the state. As a result, two boys, age 13 and 15, received voter cards in the mail. Iglesias responded by setting up a bipartisan task force to investigate. This didn’t satisfy attorney Mickey D. Barnett, who represented the 2004 Bush-Cheney campaign in New Mexico. He told Iglesias he should bring federal charges against a canvasser who forged their signatures, which he refused to do.
In a New York Times op-ed, Iglesias wrote:
“What the critics, who don’t have any experience as prosecutors, have asserted is reprehensible—namely that I should have proceeded without having proof beyond a reasonable doubt. The public has a right to believe that prosecution decisions are made on legal, not political grounds.”
Manufacturing voter fraud
The issue of fraudulent voters undermining American democracy did not spontaneously erupt. To promote national concern about voter fraud, in March 2005 GOP operatives with ties to the White House established a 501(c)4 organization called the American Center for Voting Rights (ACVR) Legislative Fund. The group went public by establishing a website, ac4vr.com. (The site has since been taken down for unknown reasons.)
According to its 990 tax forms, ACVR is based in Midlothian, Virginia, and its executive director is Robin DeJarnette, who is also the founder and executive director of the Virginia Conservative Action political action committee. However, according to the registration form for its Internet domain name, the group’s address is a mailbox at a UPS Store in Dallas. The chairman of ACVR is Brian Lunde, a former Democratic National Committee official from Texas, who in 2004 was head of Democrats for Bush.
ACVR specializes in issuing studies that purport to document a host of voter fraud cases, like the one headlined “Democrat operatives far more involved in voter intimidation and suppression in 2004 than Republicans.”
On March 21, 2005, four days after ACVR went public, Rep. Bob Ney (R-OH), then chair of the Committee on House Administration, opened hearings on 2004 election irregularities. One person who testified was ACVR National Counsel Mark “Thor” Hearne II, who described himself as “a longtime advocate of voter rights and an attorney experienced in election law.” In the aftermath of the 2000 presidential campaign, Hearne was dispatched to Florida as a Republican observer in Broward County’s manual recount, and in 2004 he worked as the national general counsel for Bush/Cheney ’04 Inc.
