Fw: Oregon Librarian Thwarts Voter-Registration Fraud

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Saturday, October 16, 2004 10:26 AM

Oregon Librarian Thwarts Voter-Registration Fraud

 

 

Republican Dirty Tricks

By Max Blumenthal, AlterNet

Posted on October 15, 2004, Printed on October 16, 2004

http://www.alternet.org/story/20190/

Just how close is dirty trickster Nathan Sproul to the Bush/Cheney re-election

campaign?

 

AlterNet has learned that Sproul, the former Arizona Republican Party and

Christian Coalition director, has cozy ties to a group of consultants working on

the Bush/Cheney campaign. According to a Democratic source well-placed in

Arizona political circles, Sproul's firm, Sproul and Associates, operates next

door to the office of Gordon C. James Public Relations (GCJPR) in Phoenix, a

Republican PR company which is coordinating various Bush/Cheney campaign events

nationwide and has provided PR services for the Coalition Provisional Authority

in Iraq. Last spring, one of GCJPR's executives, who is an advisory board member

of Bush's re-election campaign, served as the chair of a ballot campaign Sproul

was quarterbacking, while, according to the source, Sproul collaborated with a

GCJPR employee who is a White House consultant on a scheme to get independent

candidate Ralph Nader on the Arizona ballot. In both instances, Sproul's

company, Voter Outreach of America, was involved in gathering signatures.

 

In Nevada, Voter Outreach of America is accused by former employees of shredding

the registration forms of thousands of Democrats; in West Virginia, Voter

Outreach of America employees say they were instructed to mislead voters into

registering Republican and voting for Bush; in Oregon, yet another swing state,

the state attorney general has opened a criminal investigation into allegations

that Sproul's firm, which is Voter Outreach of America's parent company, was

involved in intentionally destroying or discarding voter registration forms

signed by Democrats. According to OpenSecrets.org, Sproul's firm received

$125,000 this year from the Republican National Committee for voter registration

and another $500,000 for " political consulting. "

 

The cozy ties between Sproul and Bush operatives should raise a serious

question: Is Sproul simply an overzealous lone wolf, or are his activities part

of a concerted effort by the Bush/Cheney campaign to subvert the democratic

process?

 

Gordon C. James, the founder and director of GCJPR, is a longtime Bush

apparatchik. According to his bio on GCJPR's website, James helped handle media

relations for President George H.W. Bush as the White House " lead advance

representative. " During George W. Bush's 2000 presidential campaign, James' firm

handled PR and event management for Bush's Iowa Caucus campaign, all three

debates against Al Gore, two campaign train trips and his election night

festivities in Austin, Texas. Recently, GCJPR organized a Bush mega-rally in

Phoenix and an appearance by Laura Bush at another campaign rally in

Minneapolis. James also worked for five months as L. Paul Bremer's spinmeister

in Baghdad.

 

James said all of his firm's activities on behalf of the Bush/Cheney campaign

were performed " on a volunteer basis, " though GCJPR has received funding this

year from the Republican National Committee. And James maintained that though he

knows Sproul, they don't work together. " Nathan works more on the political

side, " James stated. " We're a PR firm. "

 

Sproul did not respond to requests for an interview.

 

James did not mention that one of GCJPR's executives, George W. Bush for

President advisory board member Lisa James, served as chairwoman of an Arizona

ballot initiative that Sproul spearheaded last spring called " No Taxpayer Money

For Politicians. " The ballot measure, which was soundly defeated, was a

right-wing, corporate-funded effort to ban candidates for state office from

receiving public money for their campaigns. Sproul's Voter Outreach of America

spearheaded the measure's petition drive. In her capacity as chairwoman, Lisa

James operated directly out of Sproul's office.

 

What's more, according to a well-placed source who spoke on condition of

anonymity, a GCJPR employee, Meghan Rose, worked with Sproul on a clandestine

campaign to get Nader on the Arizona ballot last spring. Last June, Derek Lee of

Lee Petitions told me that while his company was handling various signature

drives in Arizona, Sproul's Voter Outreach of America was paying petitioners to

collect as many signatures as they could for Nader's ballot qualification

campaign. Once rumors began emerging about covert Republican assistance to

Nader, Sproul " put the hush-hush on it real quick, " Lee said.

 

In order to cover his tracks, Sproul devised a clever scheme. According to the

source, Sproul tasked GCJPR's Rose to drive the Nader petitions to a " low-end "

motel in Scottsdale where Jenny Breslyn, the person officially contracted by the

Nader campaign to oversee its signature drive, was staying. There, Breslyn and

her employees mixed the petitions in with their own, in effect, brushing them

clean of Sproul's fingerprints.

 

Rose has worked as a consultant for the Bush White House Easter Egg Roll, the

State Department and the Republican National Committee. She is currently working

out of James' RNC-funded shop and as a volunteer on Bush's re-election campaign.

Confronted with the accusation that she served as the baglady for Sproul's Nader

ballot scheme, Rose would not issue an outright denial.

 

" I do not work for Nathan Sproul, " she stated repeatedly. " I don't even know how

you got my name. "

 

Asked again to confirm or deny the accusation, Rose became testy. " I didn't do

anything. I've shaken Nathan Sproul's hand once, " she said.

 

Reached by cellphone, Jenny Breslyn refused to speak directly to the accusation

that Rose delivered Sproul's Nader petitions to her, referring the question to

Sproul, who could not be reached. However, she did volunteer that in her

dealings with Sproul, " I do know a Meghan. "

 

Sproul's dirty tricks may have finally caught up with him, though far from his

stomping grounds in Arizona. In Oregon, Sproul's firm is being investigated by

the state attorney general and could face a class-C felony, punishable by five

years in jail, for allegedly altering and destroying voter registration forms.

And in Nevada, state election officials have just launched an investigation into

whether Sproul's Voters Outreach of America destroyed the registration forms of

exclusively Democratic voters.

 

On Wednesday, Democratic National Committee Chairman Terry McAuliffe wrote a

letter to his Republican counterpart, Ed Gillespie, demanding that the

Republican National Committee detail its involvement with Sproul's alleged voter

fraud. " We are deeply concerned these reports of Republican National Committee

funded felonious activities in these states could serve to discourage all voters

from voting because of concerns of problems with their ballot, " McAuliffe wrote.

" Regardless of party or candidate, it is the civic and moral duty of both

parties to encourage complete and full participation in the democratic process. "

 

© 2004 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.

View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/20190/

http://www.alternet.org/story/20190/

 

Oregon Librarian Thwarts Voter-Registration Fraud

A librarian in Medford, Oregon, uncovered in September the real identity of a

group claiming to be part of a nonpartisan, nationwide voter-registration

organization called America Votes. The group had called and sent letters to

several libraries in Oregon, including Multnomah County, West Slope, and

Corvallis-Benton County.

 

Meghan O'Flaherty, library manager of the Jackson County Headquarters Library,

checked into a letter from a group called Sproul & Associates asking to set up a

voter-registration booth in the library. The letter began: " Our firm has been

contracted to help coordinate a national non-partisan voter registration drive,

America Votes! in several states across the nation. " Checking the Internet,

O'Flaherty found that Sproul & Associates is a political consulting firm headed

by former Arizona State Republican Party Executive Director Nathan Sproul.

 

An employee at Sproul & Associates said the group's drive is called Project

America Votes and admitted to knowing about the similar names. Claiming an

innocent mistake, Sproul said in the September 21 Medford Mail Tribune, " We were

not trying to copy their name. All we were trying to do was register people to

vote. You telling me that they even exist was really the first time I'd heard

it. "

 

O'Flaherty contacted Kevin Looper, the state organizing director for America

Votes, who told her that Sproul & Associates had absolutely nothing to do with

his organization. " You'll have to forgive me for not finding it credible that

they would not have heard of a group that is one of the largest in the country. "

He also said that America Votes is " in the process of pursuing all of our legal

options to pursue [an order to] cease and desist. "

 

Looper credits O'Flaherty's and other Oregon librarians' quick thinking in the

matter: " If it wasn't for their initiative on it, I would not have known about

it. "

 

Posted September 24, 2004.

 

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