We Be Jammin'

This could be completely innocuous. But I don't have a lot of trust anymore.

The AP reported the other day that James Tobin, a Republican operative and convicted felon who jammed Democratic phones in New Hampshire (from the firefighter's union) during a tight US Senate race (won by Republican John Sununu), frequently called the White House in the days leading up to the election. There's a prefectly good explanation for this: Tobin was running the New Hampshire race as regional director for the Republican National Committee, and the White House was obviously interested in one of the country's closest races. Tobin was calling a number at the White House political office, which in 2002 was run by none other than Ken Mehlman, current head of the RNC. On the day of the phone jamming, Tobin called 12 times. Mehlman denied discussing the phone jamming.

TPM Muckraker, all over this story, uncovers this:

The AP, in their story on calls to the White House, noted one call in particular, a 17 minute call from Jayne Millerick, then a GOP strategist working on the 2002 election. This was with the same number at the White House's Office of Political Affairs that James Tobin called so frequently.

The AP simply noted the call, and reported Millerick as saying that she "did not recall the subject" and that she hadn't learned of the plot until after the election.

But details from the phone records analyized by the Senate Majority Project suggest that Millerick was fully aware of the plot to jam the New Hampshire Democratic Party's phone lines and seriously concerned about its legality on the day of the jamming. If that's true, it suggests that the jamming was definitely on her mind when she phoned the White House on the afternoon of the crime. That call lasted from 2:59 PM to 3:16 PM.

Millerick made a run of calls on the day of the jamming that suggest that she was looking for legal advice:

At 10:32 AM on Election Day, for example, Millerick phoned the law firm of Nixon Peabody. It's been previously reported that former NH GOP chair John Dowd had ordered the jamming stopped after receiving legal advice from a lawyer named David Vicinanzo on Election Day morning. Nixon Peabody is Vicinanzo's firm.

Immediately following the call to that law firm, Jayne Millerick placed three calls to David Horan, a criminal defense attorney.

Oh yeah, and Jack Abramoff might be involved. So you know it's illegal (Abramoff gave at least $10,000 to the New Hampshire RSC that year, and there are further connections between Abramoff and the company that performed the phone jamming). And the RNC has been paying Tobin's legal bills for him.

I was skeptical, but now I'm staying with this story. There's a lot of smoke here.