Still At It

I often chronicle the voter suppression and intimidation machinations from the right. There's also the use of US Attorneys to investigate Democrats at fortunate times for their Republican opponents. Despite the high-profile nature of the Don Siegelman case and others, this element of the Republican machine hasn't been shut down. In fact, it's in full force in a Senate race in Mississippi.

As federal courtwatchers wonder if the Mississippi Beef Plant investigation will entangle Senate candidate Ronnie Musgrove, a Federal Election Commission check shows U.S. Attorney Jim Greenlee contributed to his opponent.

Greenlee was nominated for the U.S. attorney post in 2001 by President George W. Bush, supported by Mississippi Sens. Thad Cochran and Trent Lott.

On Oct. 11, 2002 - just weeks before then-U.S. Rep. Roger Wicker won another term in Congress - Greenlee made a donation of $200 to Friends of Roger Wicker [...]

In U.S. District Court, where Greenlee is the chief prosecutor, two Georgia company executives recently pleaded guilty to making an illegal campaign contribution to then-Gov. Musgrove’s 2003 re-election campaign. They admitted they hoped to ask Musgrove for help as they realized the Mississippi Beef Plant construction project was in trouble.

The project ultimately failed, leaving hundreds of people out of work and the state of Mississippi holding the bag on millions of loan guarantees. Two men have gone to prison on related fraud charges.

However, Musgrove has not been indicted and repeatedly insists he did nothing wrong.

Scott Horton has taken notice of this one, as it shares similarities with the Siegelman case that he's been following closely - a former Democratic governor in the Deep South, a Republican operative masquerading as a US Attorney, and trumped-up charges designed to take down Musgrove. These executives plead guilty to the illegal contributions in a plea deal:

The three, all executives with The Facility Group of Smyrna, Ga., were largely left off the hook on the more serious charges that they had swindled the state out of at least $2 million and had left the plant’s vendors and contractors holding the bag. Instead, they were allowed in a plea bargain to confess to trying to buy influence with Musgrove by steering $25,000 to the then-governor’s unsuccessful re-election campaign in 2003.

The orchestrated guilty pleas — and the prosecutors’ suggestion that more indictments could be forthcoming — are a boon to the campaign of Republican Roger Wicker, who was appointed to the vacant Senate seat in December but is considered vulnerable. They leave a cloud over Musgrove in voters’ minds and provide more fodder for negative campaign ads from the G.O.P. camp, even though Musgrove has not been charged with any wrongdoing and there’s nothing in the court records to document he did anything illegal.

Well, maybe we can get somebody over at the Justice Department to investigate. Or I know, an independent body like the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights! Anyone know any of their new hires?

It looks like Hans von Spakovsky, an old TPM favorite, is back in business. The former Justice Department official, whose nomination to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) was thwarted when Democrats objected to his long record of support for restrictions on voting rights, has been hired as a "consultant and temporary full-time employee" at the ostensibly bi-partisan U.S. Commission on Civil Rights (USCCR) the agency confirmed to TPMmuckraker [...]

Among Spakovsky's duties will be overseeing the USCCR's report on the Justice Department's monitoring of the 2008 presidential elections, a source inside the USCCR told TPMmuckraker.

Spakovsky's hiring is at the request of Commissioner Todd Gaziano, who works for the conservative Heritage Foundation on FEC issues and has defended Spakovsky in the press before. According to a federal government source, Gaziano has recommended Spakovsky at the government's highest payscale -- which would work out to about $124,010 annually if Spakovsky was to stay for an entire year.

Looks like we're in good hands.

The Schloz Meets His Maker?

It takes a lot for Bush's Justice Department to investigate one of its own. But that's exactly what's happening in Washington, as the politicization of the Civil Rights Division is coming to a head, with Bradley J. Schlozman, perhaps the worst of the worst, right at the front as the target.

In a report for the Huffington Post, Murray Waas reveals that a grand jury is issuing subpoenas for multiple Justice Department lawyers in the case.

The extraordinary step by the Justice Department of subpoenaing attorneys once from within its own ranks was taken because several of them refused to voluntarily give interviews to the Department Inspector General, which has been conducting its own probe of the politicization of the Civil Rights Division, the same sources said.

The grand jury has been investigating allegations that a former senior Bush administration appointee in the Civil Rights Division, Bradley Schlozman, gave false or misleading testimony on a variety of topics to the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Sources close to the investigation say that the grand jury is also more broadly examining whether Schlozman and other Department officials violated civil service laws by screening Civil Rights attorneys for political affiliation while hiring them.

As far as lying to the Senate Judiciary, that's industry standard for these Bush hacks. And we know that Monica Goodling was found by the IG to exhibit the same prejudicial hiring practices, so it would be no surprise to see Schlozman take the same role in the Civil Rights Division. There clearly was a systematic effort to weed out Democrats and liberals from the career civil service and set landmines for future Democratic Presidents inside the DoJ. And as with Goodling, I'm sure this information will be readily available to the IG.

But this part intrigues me even more:

Investigators for the Inspector General have also asked whether Schlozman, while an interim U.S. attorney in Missouri, brought certain actions and even a voting fraud indictment for political ends, according to witnesses questioned by the investigators. But it is unclear whether the grand jury is going to hear testimony on that issue as well.

This is the infamous ACORN case, where Schlozman pushed bogus voter fraud claims and brought prosecutions right before a hotly contested election in Missouri in 2006, in all probability to cast doubt on the election and reflect poorly on the Democratic candidates. Here are but a few of the charges from that election:

•Schlozman, while he was acting civil rights chief, authorized a suit accusing the state of failing to eliminate legions of ineligible people from lists of registered voters. A federal judge tossed out the suit this April 13, saying Democratic Missouri Secretary of State Robin Carnahan couldn’t police local registration rolls and noting that the government had produced no evidence of fraud.

•The Missouri General Assembly - with the White House’s help - narrowly passed a law requiring voters to show photo identification cards, which Carnahan estimated would disenfranchise 200,000 voters. The state Supreme Court voided the law as unconstitutional before the election.

•Two weeks before the election, the St. Louis Board of Elections sent letters threatening to disqualify 5,000 newly registered minority voters if they failed to verify their identities promptly, a move - instigated by a Republican appointee - that may have violated federal law. After an outcry, the board rescinded the threat.

•Five days before the election, Schlozman, then interim U.S. attorney in Kansas City, announced indictments of four voter-registration workers for a Democratic-leaning group on charges of submitting phony applications, despite a Justice Department policy discouraging such action close to an election.

•In an interview with conservative talk-show host Hugh Hewitt a couple of days before the election, Rove said he’d just visited Missouri and had met with Republican strategists who “are well aware of” the threat of voter fraud. He said the party had “a large number of lawyers that are standing by, trained and ready to intervene” to keep the election clean.

According to Waas, one of the lawyers subpoenaed was none other than Hans von Spakovsky, a former Commissioner on the Federal Election Commission who ought to have his own legal problems to deal with - regarding his lies to the Senate Judiciary Committee and obstructing an investigation into Republican voter suppression in Minnesota. Von Spakovsky may have aided in the effort to hire and fire Civil Rights Division attorneys based on ideological factors.

It's very important that this grand jury investigation goes forward. We all know that voter suppression and intimidation is baked into the cake of Republican electoral strategy. Those responsible for this politicization need to be prosecuted and convicted in the name of accountability, but also to discredit what is truly part of the Republican plan for electoral dominance.

Not Just An Old Election Problem

A lot of people are talking about these allegations about Karl Rove's role in stealing Ohio in 2004. Certainly worth paying attention to and following up. It's just as important to note that the right is not only continuing these tactics, but mainstreaming them.

At a little remarked-upon hearing this week, Rep. Keith Ellison grilled liberal blogdom's favorite punching bag Hans von Spakovsky over the voter ID laws he championed which led to disenfranchisement a couple months ago in Indiana:

ELLISON: Now here's something that happened on the May 7th Indiana election. A dozen nuns and another unknown number of students were turned away from the polls Tuesday in the first use of Indiana's stringent voter ID law since it was upheld last week by the United State Supreme Court. Mr. von Spakovsky, you wanna stop nuns from voting?

VON SPAKOVSKY: [silence]

ELLISON: Why don't you want nuns to vote, Mr. von Spakovsky?

VON SPAKOVSKY: Congressman Ellison, uh-

ELLISON: I'm just curious to know.

VON SPAKOVSKY: Those individuals, uh, were told, were- knew that they had to get an ID, they could have easily done so. They could have voted, uh, by absentee ballot- uh, nursing homes under the law are able to get-

ELLISON: ...Mr. von Spakovsky, are you aware that a 98-year old nun was turned away from the polls by a-

VON SPAKOVSKY: They all had passports-

ELLISON: Excuse me.

VON SPAKOVSKY: They had expired passports which meant that they could have gotten-

ELLISON: Mr. von Spakovsky, do you know a 98-year old nun was turned away from the polls by a sister who's in her order and who knew her, but had to turn her away because she didn't have a government-issued ID? That's okay with you?

VON SPAKOVSKY: Yes...

Okay with him? It's his most fervent dreams realized!

Ellison didn't let up there. He asked von Spakovsky pointedly about the greatest hits of US Attorney/voter fraud cases in Minnesota (where US Atty Thomas Heffelfinger was fired for ignoring voter fraud claims) and Missouri (the infamous Bradley Schlozman prosecution over a separate voter fraud case involving ACORN). Ellison basically accused him of lying to the committee and von Spakovsky became indignant. This guy was on the Federal Election Commission, just to let you know how far these completely bogus charges have progressed into the mainstream.

This voting stuff isn't going away, and if anything it's going to get more intense as Republicans get more desperate. I can't believe that this article didn't get more attention when it came out a few weeks ago. There's no question that this will became an enormous issue literally out of nowhere this fall.

Election officials worry that the state's home foreclosure problem will pose a problem this November for voters still registered at their former address, a newspaper reported Sunday.

Voters in pivotal Ohio with outdated addresses face possible pre-election challenges and trips to multiple polling places. They also are more likely to cast provisional ballots that might not be counted.

"It's a real issue," said Daniel Tokaji, an Ohio State University law professor who specializes in elections. He wonders whether foreclosures might explain the increasing percentages of provisional votes cast between 2004 and Ohio's latest election, the presidential primary in March.

Ohio provided President Bush with an 118,000-vote victory in 2004, giving him the electoral votes he needed to win the election.

All of a sudden you're going to hear that these families forced out of their homes and relocated across the country are actually fraudsters trying to steal the election for Obama. The very fact of vacancy at the addresses where these people are registered makes hundreds of thousands of people prime suspects for voter caging. And you can be sure that re-registering isn't paramount on their minds, either. In battleground states like Nevada, one out of every 120 or so homes is in foreclosure right now. This seems like a huge under-the-radar issue that is receiving literally no attention.

And there's a nexus here between these potential minefields and the voter ID laws conservatives are pushing.

Ohio's requirement that voters show identification at the polls makes it more important that they keep their registration information current, said Jeff Ortega, a spokesman for Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, Ohio's elections chief.

In 2004, the Ohio Republican Party challenged more than 31,000 newly registered voters statewide after letters it mailed out came back as undeliverable. The challenges failed, but Brunner said a new state law requiring counties to mail their own notices to all registered voters could lead to another round of pre-election challenges.

There may be plenty of illegal disenfranchisement, but is anybody paying attention to the legal version?

Friday News Dump Alert

Democrats held the line and Hans von Spakovsky is out as FEC Commissioner.

President Bush's contentious nominee for the Federal Election Commission has yanked his name from consideration, potentially ending a broader confirmation deadlock in the Senate.

Hans von Spakovsky, a former Justice Department official who never had Democratic support to win confirmation, withdrew his nomination on Friday.

Bush "reluctantly accepted" von Spakovsky's request, the White House said.

I heard that Bush was giving up on the von Spakovsky nomination in solidarity with the troops.

Get this, Hans sez that the drawn-out nomination process has been terribly hard on his family and he doesn't have the financial resources to wait around. Well that's just terrible. Hopefully some think tank like Heritage or AEI in need of a known vote suppressor on staff will pick up the slack for him. Or maybe someone is needed to go around the country and agitate for crap voter ID laws to depress turnout in November. I'm sure he'll find something.

This is kind of a big deal because it'll break the deadlock at the FEC and get it to function again in this election year. And with McCain breaking finance laws with each passing day by continuing to spend primary money over the limit without getting out of the public system, the oversight agency ought to be in working order. (I say kind of because the FEC is a rather toothless body)

But really it's big because of poor George and Hans, getting kicked around again. It feels good to win one every so often.

Shows How Much Power Bush Has

Mitch McConnell is the de facto President right now.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), said he would not allow Democrats a separate vote on each nominee and instead wanted the FEC nominees voted on as a package, which would ensure approval of the most controversial GOP pick, Hans von Spakovsky. Democrats have made it clear that von Spakovsky would not pass the Senate while the other four nominees would be approved.

The FEC consists of six commissioners, and the agency needs a minimum of four commissioners to meet a quorum and issue legal opinions. Since the beginning of this year, the FEC has had only two working commissioners and has been unable to deal with everything from John McCain's public financing to every day legal opinions on campaign ads.

McConnell said no deal has been made and he wants von Spakovsky approved along with the two pending Democrats and two pending Republican nominees.

McConnell said "they'll either let all six [ commissioners] go, or we will not have solved the problem."

Remember, Reid brokered this deal with the White House. But McConnell could care less.

For context, McConnell in the past has been a real problem for John McCain, and they've particularly clashed over campaign finance reform - he was the lawmaker who took McCain-Feingold to court. So considering that the "deal" would get rid of McCain enemy David Mason from the FEC, McConnell isn't exactly falling all over himself to throw the Republican nominee a lifeline. In addition, McConnell, who's up for re-election and is as shady as they come when it comes to fundraising, is maybe the least likely politician in Washington to want a working FEC.

A non-functional FEC during a Presidential election year is a recipe for chaos. But Harry Reid hasn't been able to figure out a way to squeeze McConnell on this (or any of his obstructionism) whatsoever, even though his denial of an "upperdown vote" is the height of hypocrisy from the party of Justice Sunday. So the stalemate continues.

Deal And No Deal

The good news - President Bush and top Democrats have the framework of a deal that would provide us with a working FEC for the general election. The bad news - it's an exceedingly strange "deal".

To break the impasse, President George W. Bush nominated three new candidates to serve on the panel, but he refused to withdraw his nomination of Republican Hans von Spakovsky to serve on the FEC despite Democrats' opposition.

They have blocked his nomination because of his work at the Justice Department's voting division, questioning whether he tried to inject politics into the group meant to independently oversee the country's voting laws.

The White House believes he "would be confirmed by the Senate if allowed a vote," said White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten in a letter to Reid on Tuesday.

As part of the package, Bush nominated Democrat Cynthia Bauerly, legislative director to New York Sen. Charles Schumer, Republican attorney Donald McGahn, and Republican Caroline Hunter, who works on the Election Assistance Commission.

Let's look at that again. Bush nominated von Spakovsky and two new Republicans. One of them would replace current FEC commissioner David Mason. Mason, one of two remaining on the FEC at present, has been a thorn in the side of presumptive GOP nominee John W. McCain.

In February, the McCain campaign notified the FEC that it was withdrawing from the public financing system for the primary. Although McCain had once opted in, his campaign said that it had never received public funds and so could opt out. The move meant that McCain would not be bound by the $54 million spending limit for the system.

But Mason balked. McCain couldn't just opt out -- the FEC had to approve his request before he could. And Mason also indicated that a tricky bank loan might mean that McCain had locked himself in to the system. That would be disastrous for the campaign, since the Dem nominee would have a tremendous spending advantage through August. So McCain's campaign has continued to spend away, far surpassing the limit already. The Democratic Party has filed a complaint with the FEC and has also taken the matter to court.

And now Mason is getting the boot.

So the Bush Administration fired Mason, in essence, for insubordination, and will offer the same vote suppression expert von Spakovsky as part of their "deal."

'Scuse me?

The one concession in this deal is that von Spakovsky will get a separate vote. Now, the Bush Administration fully believes he'll pass under that standard, while Harry Reid's office says they "expect" to defeat von Spakovsky. But I don't know what they're basing that on. As far as I can tell there's no "upperdown vote" agreed to here, so his confirmation could be filibustered. Still, Mitch McConnell is wily and there are so many obstructions they've thrown up in the past, that I could easily see a scenario where they agree to move forward on some minor initiatives in exchange for von Spakovsky's nomination. Alternatively, the Republicans will relent on von Spakovsky in exchange for retroactive immunity for the telecoms. There are a lot of balls in the air.

That must not happen. Christy at FDL details why von Spakovsky is simply unacceptable and urges you to call members of the Senate Rules Committee, which has jurisdiction. It's not worth it to get a known vote suppressor installed on the ruling electoral body in the United States, and pick off a Republican who seems to have a functioning independent mind in the process.

Big-Spendin' McCain Update

So the DNC's complaint to the FEC is clearly getting under John McCain's skin. Leading to this ludicrous framing: that ripping off American taxpayers is a civil rights issue:

...Potter said the Supreme Court concluded that public financing for campaigns is constitutional because it is voluntary. "As a result, candidates have a constitutional right to withdraw from the program."

Of course, the problem is they've already USED the program. They used the money to get ballot access in Ohio and Delaware (Here's the relevant proof from Ohio, and the one from Delaware). They used the money in the public system to get a bank loan. There is no known Constitutional right that I know of for using public money and then pretending you didn't.

So in addition to the "Because I said so" defense, McCain is going to have to get an FEC ruling. Only the FEC only has two commissioners on it, due to a jam caused by Hans von Spakovsky's nomination and the unwillingness by Senate Republicans to decouple his confirmation from the other three broadly acceptable commissioners-in-waiting. Keep in mind that the DNC could actually file suit to force compliance on this. So John McCain may have to rely on Mitch McConnell to save his Presidential campaign. Which puts McConnell, who has been public enemy #1 on campaign finance issues, in a unique position.

This puts the Dems in a strong position--by denying the FEC a quorum, they can deny McCain the ability to get out of matching funds. They don't have to do anything except continue to refuse to consider all four nominated commissioners a hearing together; so long as they continue to insist that von Spakovsky receive his own hearing, things won't move forward.

Unless Mitch McConnell budges on his insistence that all the commissioners receive a hearing together.

But here 's the thing. Mitch McConnell (whom I'd include among those GOP bigwigs whose support Mitt would get before threatening to un-suspend his campaign) hates John McCain. Absolutely hates him.

In fact, I'd say that McConnell is one of the most likely sources for the Iseman story in the first place. After all, the first piece of evidence to counter McCain's denials was McCain's deposition in McConnell's suit against the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law (BCRA is one of the reasons McConnell hates McCain so much). The deposition was given to McConnell's attorney in that suit, Floyd Abrams. While the deposition is publicly available, it is likely that someone pointed Isikoff to it. If so, I'm guessing that someone is rather closer to McConnell than he is to McCain.

Meanwhile, the good government reform groups have taken a complete pass on McCain's dirty effort to rip off taxpayers. Public Citizen (the group founded by Ralph Nader) is even offering testimony on McCain's behalf. This is nuts.

I've alluded to this with subtle jabs, but it's time to come out and say it clearly: There are a set of groups in Washington identified with the cause of campaign finance reform that seem to sit up at night staring at a picture of John McCain and waiting for the phone to ring. The four-year affair that ended with passage of the McCain-Feingold legislation banning soft money was the high point of their lives (to their credit, it was quite a political achievement -- still the only piece of legislation enacted over the objections of a majority of Republicans and the misgivings of Bush) but at this point, especially after the (entirely predictable) Supreme Court decision striking down its restrictions on television ads, McCain-Feingold doesn't amount to more than a memory.

This unrequited loyalty not only apparently gives McCain a free pass on abuses such as the loan; it has allowed him to essentially dominate the field, without lifting a finger. McCain's monopoly, as the only Republican interested in reform, gave him incredible power over the agenda (pushing purely restrictive policies, such as the proposed restrictions on political bloggers in 2005, and on non-profits the previous year) and leverage over the organizations, whose support from foundations depends on being bipartisan. This "McCain Wing" of the campaign finance reform movement is led by Democracy 21 and the Campaign Legal Center, both generally admirable and adept organizations, with small staffs and significant influence on the Hill and with reporters and editorial writers. The largest campaign finance organization, and the only one with real members, Common Cause, has been gradually moving beyond the cramped, restrictive view of reform represented by the McCain wing toward a more open approach, with great internal angst -- a longer story than can be told in a blog post!

Matt Stoller has more on Common Cause's legacy of failure. These so-called Democratic allies simply have not properly understood the current political climate and have hampered efforts at progressive change over and over. The single-issue groups have to adapt to remain relevant. And part of that is recognizing the big picture rather than keeping loyalty to Republicans who offer little more than lip service to them.

UPDATE: I forgot: McCain's other defense of his actions was to whine "B-But Howard Dean did it too," always my favorite Republican excuse for lawbreaking - "but it was widespread lawbreaking!" And in this case, it's not true, and Dean has the primary evidence. The bottom line is that Dean didn't take out a loan with public money used as collateral, and he didn't use the public system to save millions in ballot access fees.

The Right To Vote

Patrick Leahy just endorsed Barack Obama, and the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee had this to say about this flap over the "at-large" precincts in Nevada being set up for shift workers at the casinos.

Leahy also came out strongly against the ongoing lawsuit in Nevada, where the state teachers union and some Clinton backers are trying to shut down the special caucus locations for Las Vegas Strip workers. "If you're shutting people out from the nominating process, you're going to be discouraging people all the way down," Leahy said. "And that's not the approach we want to take in the United States."

John Kerry also came out very strongly against this tactic at TPM Cafe yesterday.

For too many years, American politics has been divided between two types of people: those who want more people to vote, and those who want fewer people to vote. Just last week, the Bush-packed Supreme Court heard oral arguments about the kind of law we’ve become all too familiar with these last years: an Indiana law putting more roadblocks in the way of people who simply want to vote. (Talk about a not so subtle reminder of why some of us filibustered Sam Alito’s nomination two years ago this month.)

Well, it’s troubling to me that now we see another kind of effort to keep people from voting in Nevada. But this time, it’s not the Republicans trying to limit the vote, it’s a fight within our own Party [...]

Here are the details. Last March, the Nevada Democratic Party came together and put together the rules of the caucus. Because of the high number of casino workers in Las Vegas, and because those workers have to work on weekends, the Democrats of Nevada decided to have special, at-large caucus sites in certain select areas (like right on the Vegas Strip) to give those working people a chance to make their voices heard. The Culinary Workers Union, who represents the workers, celebrated the move.

Suddenly, a mere days before the caucus, we now see a lawsuit to shut down those at-large sites and deny the casino workers their right to vote. Three of the plaintiffs voted for the very plan they’re now trying to block – reasonable people have guessed they’re changing their minds presumably because just a few days ago the Culinary Workers Union endorsed Barack Obama.

Here’s the bottom line. I understand people gut it out to win on Election Day. But certain tactics make victory pyrrhic – empty – hollow – and it’s not worth winning if you lose what really counts in the process. And you know what, if the Culinary Workers had backed someone besides my choice in this race - Barack Obama - I’d still say it’s right for every candidate to make sure these workers get to vote.

Many have claimed that the Clinton campaign is not behind this effort by the teacher's union, but the fact that Bill Clinton lost his shit on a news reporter who tried to bring this up should throw some cold water on that suggestion.

Mr. Clinton turned the tables on Mr. Matthews, whom the former president asserted had taken "an accusatory tone" by claiming a link to Mrs. Clinton's operation. "Your position is that you think the Culinary Workers votes should count: A--it should be easier for them to vote than anybody else in Nevada that has to work on Saturday. That's your first position. Second, when they do vote their votes should count five times as much as everybody else. That's what the teachers have questioned. So if that's your position, you have it. Get on your television station and say it.... 'All I care about is making sure that some voters have it easier than others and that when they do vote, when it's already easier for them, their vote should count five times as much as others.' That is your position," Mr. Clinton said. "If you want to take that position, get on the television and take it. Don't be accusatory with me. I have enough to deal with." [...]

At one point during the exchange with the TV reporter, (Oakland) Mayor Ron Dellums tried to physically pull Mr. Clinton away, but the former president held his ground.

I have to say that, of all the misunderstandings and misinterpretations and smears by surrogates and everything in this primary, the concerted strategy of disenfranchisement, a tactic at odds with the core values of the Democratic Party in the 21st century, is the most troubling. This is not a media creation or something blown out of proportion or the result of an emotional reading of the impact of race or gender. This is about the right to vote. The Nevada State Democratic Party set these caucuses up in March. The DNC approved them. The state board approved them. I've been privy to similar processes in the California Democratic Party, and they are a transparent, open, small-d democratic process. If the teacher's union or their representatives in the NSDP wanted to object to this they had ample opportunity to do so nine months ago.

We have to make the right to vote sacrosanct. The defining feature of our political lives in this century is the Florida recount, and the voter suppression tactics used prior to Election Day. Republicans successfully manipulated the vote and mau-maued the media into defusing the controversy. There is no glory in any Democrat using the same tactic to win a primary or a general election.

Barack Obama has given us all pause with his comments about President Reagan (The charitable interpretation is that he's simply building on St. Ronnie's hagiography by trying to get some reflected glory for himself; I don't think good progressives should be legitimizing that false portrait). But Obama has been a stalwart on voting rights; in fact, it's one of the rare moments in his Senate career where he boldly led.

Jane Hamsher is correct that this attack on Obama from the Politico is unfair. The FEC cannot implement the provisions of legislation Obama pushed through because Obama (among others) placed a hold on Hans Von Spakovsky, a horrific pick to be a commissioner of the FEC. Obama has been very good on voting rights, and it's ridiculous to hold him accountable for Bush's propensity to pick as regulators people who don't believe in the mission of the agency they are supposed to run.

Abrogating the right to vote in any form or fashion is not a road that Democrats should ever go down. The Obama campaign hasn't been particularly energizing for progressives, but on this he has it absolutely right, and the teachers are trying to punish his supporters in Nevada simply for being his supporters. That is wrong. And the Clinton campaign shouldn't want to get a victory that way.

Not Like They'll Stop With The Voter Suppression

I know that Digby has done a lot of work on the coming Republican emphasis on bogus claims of "voter fraud," turning the tables on Democratic concerns about our elections and giving a pretense to increased voter suppression and intimidation. The Supreme Court is about to weigh in on some cases that are very central to this effort.

The Supreme Court will open the new year with its most politically divisive case since Bush v. Gore decided the 2000 presidential election, and its decision could force a major reinterpretation of the rules of the 2008 contest.

The case presents what seems to be a straightforward and even unremarkable question: Does a state requirement that voters show a specific kind of photo identification before casting a ballot violate the Constitution? [...]

"It is exceedingly difficult to maneuver in today's America without a photo ID (try flying, or even entering a tall building such as the courthouse in which we sit, without one)," Circuit Judge Richard A. Posner, a Ronald Reagan appointee, wrote in deciding that Indiana's strictest-in-the-nation law is not burdensome enough to violate constitutional protections.

His colleague on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, Bill Clinton appointee Terence T. Evans, was equally frank in dissent. "Let's not beat around the bush: The Indiana voter photo ID law is a not-too-thinly veiled attempt to discourage election-day turnout by certain folks believed to skew Democratic," Evans wrote.

These cases are a solution in search of a problem. Indeed there have been virtually no credible documented cases of voter fraud almost everywhere in the country. This idea to institute this voter ID law came right out of the Justice Department and directly from the lead villian in these matters, the guy who but for 9 second pro forma Congressional sessions might be sitting on the Federal Election Commission by now.

(Hans) Von Spakovsky was the voting counsel in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division from 2003 to 2005. In that role, he supported Georgia's voter photo identification law despite the objections of four of the five government attorneys on a panel set up to make sure the Georgia law complied with the Voting Rights Act, who warned that the law would hurt minority voters because they were less likely to have photo IDs, according to former Justice Department officials. "Spakovsky played a major role in the implementation of practices which injected partisan political factors into decision making," said six former Justice staffers in a letter to senators.

Von Spakovsky, like other Republicans, argues that such strict voter ID laws are needed to combat fraud. Von Spakovsky's election administration experience includes sitting on the Fulton County Board of Registration and Elections, which administers elections in the largest county in Georgia.

The Brennan Center for Justice at New York University Law School asserts that von Spakovsky's partisan bias extends beyond his signing off on the Georgia bill. Citing recently released E-mails, it says that he tried to quash the U.S. Election Assistance Commission's efforts to support voting ID rules in Arizona and tried to cancel a research contract on the impact of and need for voter ID. (He would not comment for this story.)

It's a real simple plan. The idea is to put these laws in place, under-report them to the populace, and use them to invalidate the votes of hundreds of thousands of low-income and elderly citizens, many of whom vote Democratic. All this to stop the "scourge" of non-existent incidents of voter fraud. Which is a fake scourge whipped up by the Republican noise machine and absolutely tied to this sudden demonization of illegal immigrants.

Indiana Secretary of State Todd Rokita (R) said voter fraud was something he was asked about "almost daily" by constituents. "At the Kiwanis Club, the chamber of commerce groups, people would say, 'Why aren't you asking who I am when I vote?' " Rokita said.

This, by the way, is why we must continue pressing for answers in the US Attorney probe. The firing of the eight federal prosecutors is intimately tied to their unwillingness to pursue B.S. vote fraud cases. If that investigation, and the look into who was giving the orders to fire, is pushed aside for the sake of bipartisan comity or a desire not to confront the President, then we'll never see the reality of the politicization of justice and the use of federal prosecutor offices as an arm of the RNC. Which will make it that much easier for these needless voter ID laws to be adopted nationwide, expanding the voter suppression.

The Siegelman Case And The Politicization of Justice

Wingnut noise machine freak-outs like attacking a sick 12 year-old serve a useful purpose, regardless of the lies. The intent is to distract the media and even the progressive movement while the politicized federal government goes about their deceitful business. The quintessential example of this is the Don Siegelman case. Siegelman, the Democratic former governor of Alabama, was railroaded and convicted of corruption in office last year. Apparently, the lobbyist who "blew the whistle" on Siegelman had dealings with a lot of Alabama politicians, many of then Republicans.

On may 8, 2002, Clayton Lamar (Lanny) Young Jr., a lobbyist and landfill developer described by acquaintances as a hard-drinking "good ole boy," was in an expansive mood. In the downtown offices of the U.S. Attorney in Montgomery, Ala., Young settled into his chair, personal lawyer at his side, and proceeded to tell a group of seasoned prosecutors and investigators that he had paid tens of thousands of dollars in apparently illegal campaign contributions to some of the biggest names in Alabama Republican politics. According to Young, among the recipients of his largesse were the state's former attorney general Jeff Sessions, now a U.S. Senator, and William Pryor Jr., Sessions' successor as attorney general and now a federal judge. Young, whose detailed statements are described in documents obtained by TIME, became a key witness in a major case in Alabama that brought down a high-profile politician and landed him in federal prison with an 88-month sentence. As it happened, however, that official was the top Democrat named by Young in a series of interviews, and none of the Republicans whose campaigns he fingered were investigated in the case, let alone prosecuted.

The Siegelman investigation was clearly politicized, a fact stated by 44 former state Attorney Generals from both sides of the aisle. But this revelation calls things into question even further. It seems that the initial cause of the investigation included a lot of actionable information on Republicans - but that information was simply forgotten.

The prosecutor in the case claims that nothing untoward was done here - that Lanny Young's description of payments to Jeff Sessions were "legitimate." Does this sound legitimate to you?

Early in the investigation, in November 2001, Young announced that five years earlier, he "personally provided Sessions with cash campaign contributions," according to an FBI memo of the interview. Prosecutors didn't follow up that surprising statement with questions, but Young volunteered more. The memo adds that "on one occasion he [Young] provided Session [sic] with $5,000 to $7,000 using two intermediaries," one of whom held a senior position with Sessions' campaign. On another occasion, the FBI records show, Young talked about providing "$10,000 to $15,000 to Session [sic]. Young had his secretaries and friends write checks to the Sessions campaign and Young reimbursed the secretaries and friends for their contributions."

If true, Young's statements describe political money laundering that would be a clear violation of federal law.

This Time article is a blueprint for how the Justice Department has acted in the Bush/Rove era, as a political arm of the Republican Party. And we've seen this habit throughout the federal government. We've seen Scott Jennings briefing members of the General Services Administration about how they can help Republican candidates (Jennings, incidentally, resigned last week, right on the heels of this Time article, interestingly enough). We've seen the efforts to install a known vote suppressor, Hans Von Spakovsky, onto the Federal Election Commission. And now we're seeing it in this case in Alabama. There's a hearing scheduled about this in the Senate Judiciary Committee this week. Jeff Sessions sits on that committee. He must recuse himself. The Justice Department has refused to turn over any documents regarding the Siegelman case. How can the Democrats confirm someone to run that Department without them?

Von Spakovsky To Have Separate Vote

It's abhorrent that someone whose entire professional career has been devoted to suppressing minority votes would be given an opportunity to sit on the Federal Election Commission, but that's what's happening. However, it will be a separate vote, which is not really a separate vote. Instead of voting on all 4 new FEC Commissioners at once, Hans Von Spakovsky will get his own vote. But he's still tied to the other three.

The plan hatched Wednesday would allow von Spakovsky’s nomination to move to the floor separately with two hours of debate beforehand. If his nomination passes, as Democratic aides predict it would, the Senate would move to votes on the other three uncontested FEC nominees.

Von Spakovsky’s opponents agreed to the deal because it would allow senators to vote against his appointment while voting in favor of the other nominees.

If von Spakovsky’s nomination should fail, the Senate would not consider the other nominees.

“It’s all or nothing,” Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) said Wednesday afternoon.

So this is a bit of kabuki theater so that some Senators can go back to their states and say "See, I tried!" There's some Democrat from Nevada who's up for a vote, so Harry Reid wants him confirmed. And he'll allow a known vote suppressor on the Commission - in an election year! - in order to get it done.

But not so fast. Russ Feingold is having none of it:

A credible but non-Hill source told me that Feingold is going to object to McConnell's attempt to force von Spakovsky onto the FEC through this tactic. I don't know if the FEC will shut down if it doesn't have enough commissioners, but this is another back-against-the-wall surge strategy maneuver from the right-wing.

Feingold's standing his ground. Good for Russ. And Reid is not. Boo.

You can always count on Russ to do the right thing. He should put a hold on the whole process.

UPDATE: Apparently Barack Obama scuttled the deal.

Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) on Wednesday derailed a plan blessed by Senate leaders to vote on controversial Federal Election Commission White House nominee Hans von Spakovsky, a move giving Democrats time to breathe in the ongoing Senate stalemate on FEC nominees. ...

But a vote on the deal, which was expected to come to the floor as early as today, appeared to be off by mid-day Wednesday after Obama — and unconfirmed others — voiced concerns that von Spakovsky’s nomination was too controversial not to go through regular floor proceedings.

A Democratic aide said Senate offices continue to explore "concerns with Mr. von Spakovsky, if they rise to the level of other objections, as well as where the caucus lies."

That's leadership, right there, leading by example.

Vote Suppressor on the FEC?

I've written about Hans von Spakovsky a couple times in the past. The man has done more to suppress voting rights in this country through bogus claims of "voter fraud" than anyone in the Bush Adminstration. He's a critical part of the overall Republican project to stop minorities from voting and move toward a permanent GOP majority. And now, via a recess appointment, he sits on the FEDERAL ELECTION COMMISSION. Van Spakovsky engineered the Texas redistricting. He authorized Georgia's voter ID law, which is akin to a poll tax (a similar law will go before the Supreme Court soon). He... oh, let me have Dahlia Lithwick tell you.

Von Spakovsky currently sits on the FEC as a result of a recess appointment made by President Bush in January of 2006. Before that he served as counsel to the assistant attorney general in the Civil Rights Division at Justice. Von Spakovsky's Senate confirmation hearing last June was noteworthy for many oddities, not the least of which was a letter sent to the rules committee by six former career professionals in the voting rights section of the Justice Department; folks who had worked under both Republican and Democratic administrations for a period that spanned 36 years. The letter urged the committee to reject von Spakovsky on the grounds that while at DoJ, he was one of the architects of a transformation in the voting rights section from its "historic mission to enforce the nation's civil rights laws without regard to politics, to pursuing an agenda which placed the highest priority on the partisan political goals of the political appointees who supervised the Section." The authors named him as the "point person for undermining the Civil Rights Division's mandate to protect voting rights."

Von Spakovsky's response to these charges at his confirmation hearings? "I was not the decision maker," he claimed. "I don't remember that complaint at all,'' he demurred. "It's privileged," he insisted. That's the kind of bobbing and weaving that likely cost Alberto Gonzales his job. That the same absurd testimony from von Spakovsky might be rewarded with a professional upgrade is unfathomable.

The vote came up in the Senate Rules Committee today. Democrats hold a 10-9 edge in this committee and could have bottled up Von Spakovsky's appointment. Except...

During the Rule Committee’s executive meeting Wednesday, Feinstein originally said she wanted to vote on each nominee separately, as opposed to considering all four nominees together in one vote, as the committee has done in the past. Republicans on the panel objected, arguing that the move breaks all known committee precedent on moving FEC nominations.

"The precedent is very clear," said Sen. Bob Bennett (Utah), the ranking Republican on the panel. "Nominations to the FEC have always been reported en bloc and in pairs."

But Feinstein said committee rules governing FEC nominations allow only for passing nominations that have unanimous consent, which her objection would prevent. After about a half-hour of negotiation, Feinstein and Bennett agreed to pass all of the nominations without recommendation [...]

Bottom line: the nominations now go to the floor for a full Senate vote. Von Spakovsky has passed the first hurdle.

Now, couldn't Feinstein have forced the issue? Couldn't she have held a vote on whether or not they should consider the nominees together or separately? Sure. But the Rules committee is divided 10-9 in favor of Democrats. And guess what?

You'll never guess!

This morning's result: faced with the defection of a Democrat on the committee, later revealed to be Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE), Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) chose to agree to send all four nominees, two Democrats and two Republicans, to the floor without recommendation.

Unbelievable. I'm sure the same hand-tying will occur in the full Senate, and Von Spakovsky, a known liar and vote suppressor, will get a lifetime appointment to the FEC. Where he'll get to make rulings on things like this:

Ohio and Florida, which provided the decisive electoral votes for President Bush's two razor-thin national election triumphs, have enacted laws that election experts say will help Republicans impede Democratic-leaning minorities from voting in 2008.

Backers of the new laws say they're aimed at curbing vote fraud. But the statutes also could facilitate a controversial Republican tactic known as "vote caging,'' which the GOP attempted in Ohio and Florida in 2004 before public disclosures foiled the efforts, said Joseph Rich, a former Justice Department voting rights chief in the Bush administration who's now with the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights.

Caging, used in the past to target poor minorities in heavily Democratic precincts, entails sending mass mailings to certain voters and then using the undelivered letters to compile lists of voters for eligibility challenges.

I'm sure he'll be very sensitive to possibilities for partisan meddling with the election process.

I know that when the Bush Administration throws all of these bad nominees at you at once, it's hard even to keep track. But it would just take one Senator to put a hold on this nomination for good. This really cannot stand.

Pass the Republican Memory Loss Act of 2007

People laugh, but I think we have a real epidemic here. Whether from vitamin deficiency, a chromosomal imbalance, or too much time spent arguing that the estate tax affects small farms, Republicans are losing their memories left and right, and we simlpy have to do something about it.

I propose a landmark mental health initiative, offered in the Congress, called the "Republican Memory Loss Act of 2007," which would provide $50 million dollars of federal funding into research and development for the National Institute for Health, to determine just what happens when Republicans are forced to testify before Congress or a grand jury and suddenly lose all recollection of their work.

Poor Hans von Spakovsky, for example, simply can't remember his entire tenure in the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department.

Another former Justice Department lawyer went before Congress on Wednesday with few answers for his Democratic interrogators and a spotty memory.

Hans von Spakovsky, who's seeking a full six-year term on the Federal Election Commission, deflected questions about whether he undermined voting rights laws, saying, "I was not the decision maker in the front office of the Civil Rights Division."

Time and again during his confirmation hearing, he cited either the attorney-client privilege or a cloudy memory for his purported role in restricting minorities' voting rights.

Von Spakovsky couldn't remember blocking an investigation into complaints that a Minnesota Republican official was discriminating against Native American voters before the 2004 election.

Under oath, he also said he didn't recall seeing data from the state of Georgia that would have undercut a push by senior officials within the Civil Rights Division to approve the state's tough new law requiring photo IDs of all voters. The data showed that 300,000 Georgia voters lacked driver's licenses. A federal judge later threw out the law as unconstitutional.

He just doesn't remember, guys. You wouldn't throw your dear old grandmother in jail just because she doesn't remember anything from her days as a flapper girl in the 1920s. And we shouldn't be doing the same with Republicans. They aren't cynically pretending to forget to wiggle out of their legal troubles. They have a disease.

Like poor Lurita Doan who has searched and searched her memory about a meeting with the GSA exhorting them to use the office to help Republican candidates in 2006, and could only remember that there were cookies at the meeting. Now, if she were Proust, that rememberance of madeleines would have set off a rich tapestry of rememberances of things past. But she's not, she's a Republican afflicted with this scourge of memory loss.

Chairman Waxman: “At our March hearing, you repeatedly claimed you could not recall any information about the January 26, 2007 meeting or the White House political presentation, and you had absolutely no memory of asking GSA employees how they could help Republican candidates in upcoming elections. That’s what you told us. We questioned you over and over again. You remember there were cookies, you remembered you came in late, you remembered that some employees didn’t attend, but beyond that you said you had no further information. Five weeks later you testified before the Office of Special Counsel and suddenly you had a new enriched details about the meeting and your statements. According to your OSC testimony, you said you asked the White House presenter, how can GSA help its cabinet liaison understand that the opening of the San Francisco federal building would be a perfect event for President Bush to attend. Did you say that to the Office of Special Counsel?”

Doan: “Yes, I believe I did.”

Do you see how this kind of memory loss can spread? Sure, Republicans remember things at just the right time, but in the interim they swim in a sea of unconsciousness, just looking for the one trigger that can bring them back to balance. It's not a life, it's a hellscape.

Just ask the FBI.

An internal FBI audit has found that the bureau potentially violated the law or agency rules more than 1,000 times while collecting data about domestic phone calls, e-mails and financial transactions in recent years, far more than was documented in a Justice Department report in March that ignited bipartisan congressional criticism.

You think they KNEW they were violating the law 1,000 times when they did it? Of course not! They were just following the dictates of their Republican executive branch masters, who don't have the brain capacity to know the law. And we simply must do something about that.

Steve Benen gives his medical diagnosis.

What is it with Republicans and their memories? Giuliani can’t remember being briefed on Bernie Kerik, Alberto Gonzales can’t remember anything, neither can Kyle Sampson, Lurita Doan doesn’t remember important meetings, and John McCain doesn’t remember his policy positions, Karl Rove doesn’t remember talking to Matt Cooper about Valerie Plame. Scooter Libby doesn’t remember how he learned about Plame’s status at the CIA. Condoleezza Rice doesn’t remember Iran reaching out for diplomatic negotiations with the U.S. in 2003.

These poor folks can’t seem to remember much, can they? Aren’t there memory tricks and/or mnemonic techniques that could give them a hand?

No Steve, it's a disease. And it requires a massive public effort to properly understand and treat it. We have done great things in the medical field over the decades. We stopped polio. We fought smallpox and malaria (not in Africa, of course, but here it's pretty much under control). We have constantly moved forward in innovative ways to halt afflictions once thought incurable. Surely we can lick this terrible scourge that affects 1 in 2 Republicans in Washington.

Lurita Doan is forgetting tenses. Forgetting tenses! She's not going to know how to use a fork by next week! We have to do something! We must pass the Republican Memory Loss Act of 2007 and ensure that the GOP has control of their mental faculties from this point forward. Otherwise, how can we trust them in any position of government?

(Run with this one, Rahm Emanuel, you're just the asshole to actually put this to a vote on the House floor)

Gonzogate Update

Josh Marshall gives a nice rundown of what's ahead in the US Attorney scandal. The President amusingly complained that the investigation is being dragged out for "political reasons." To which I say: exactly. For political reasons, the Justice Department is hiding what they know and resisting all efforts to obtain documents to finish the process.

But onward it goes. The Inspector General of the Justice Department is expanding its investigation to include those political, illegal hiring practices that Monica Goodling discussed in her testimony. But it's actually bigger than Goodling.

Goodling admitted last week to improperly taking poltiical considerations into account in the hiring of assistant U.S. attorneys, immigration judges and appointments to the Board of Immigration Appeals. But the IG and OPR's investigation appears to go far beyond Goodling.

Allegations concerning political hiring for the Honors Program -- the Department's historically rigorous program for hiring entry-level lawyers -- have centered on Michael Elston, the chief of staff to the deputy attorney general. A group of anonymous Justice Department employees raised alarms with Congress last month, complaining that Elston rejected hundreds of potential applicants to the program last year seemingly based on their political backgrounds.

And Goodling also hasn't been implicated in allegedly political hiring practices in the Department's Civil Rights Division. Those allegations have centered on Bradley Schlozman, the former #2 at the division, who has been accused of recruiting Republicans for career spots and then asking them to scrub mentions of their GOP bona fides from their resumes. Schlozman subsequently was appointed as an interim U.S. attorney in Kansas City -- and returned to main Justice to work in the Executive Office of United States Attorneys after he was replaced by a Senate-confirmed U.S. attorney. He's scheduled to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee this coming Tuesday.

On June 5, Bradley Schlozman and his predecessor in the USA for Missouri slot, Todd Graves, will be testifying to Congress, which should be very interesting. Schlozman is the Zelig of this scandal, appearing at virtually every spot, particularly where voter fraud cases are concerned. We know that the central rationale for firing these federal prosecutors, and for politicizing the Justice Department in general, was to push bogus voter fraud investigations in order to inavalidate and intimidate potential voters, and suppress turnout. We know that this hue and cry served to curb legitimate voting:

During four years as a Justice Department civil rights lawyer, Hans von Spakovsky went so far in a crusade against voter fraud as to warn of its dangers under a pseudonym in a law journal article [...]

Now, amid a scandal over politicization of the Justice Department, Congress is beginning to examine allegations that von Spakovsky was a key player in a Republican campaign to hang onto power in Washington by suppressing the votes of minority voters.

"Mr. von Spakovsky was central to the administration's pursuit of strategies that had the effect of suppressing the minority vote," charged Joseph Rich, a former Justice Department voting rights chief who worked under him.

He and other former career department lawyers say that von Spakovsky steered the agency toward voting rights policies not seen before, pushing to curb minor instances of election fraud by imposing sweeping restrictions that would make it harder, not easier, for Democratic-leaning poor and minority voters to cast ballots.

Those four paragraphs tell pretty much the entire story of this scandal. The idea was to use voter fraud cases as a pretext to impose draconian voting laws that would suppress Democratic turnout. This is an ongoing, decades-long project, where fake grassroots "voting rights" groups just appear and disappear at opportune moments, when it's useful to powerful interests to have a cabal yelling from the outside.

The American Center for Voting Rights... has literally just disappeared as an organization... With no notice and little comment, ACVR—the only prominent nongovernmental organization claiming that voter fraud is a major problem, a problem warranting strict rules such as voter-ID laws—simply stopped appearing at government panels and conferences. Its Web domain name has suddenly expired, its reports are all gone (except where they have been preserved by its opponents), and its general counsel, Mark "Thor" Hearne, has cleansed his résumé of affiliation with the group. Hearne won't speak to the press about ACVR's demise. No other group has taken up the "voter fraud" mantra.

The death of ACVR says a lot about the Republican strategy of raising voter fraud as a crisis in American elections. Presidential adviser Karl Rove and his allies, who have been ghostbusting illusory dead and fictional voters since the contested 2000 election, apparently mounted a two-pronged attack. One part of that attack, at the heart of the current Justice Department scandals, involved getting the DoJ and various U.S. attorneys in battleground states to vigorously prosecute cases of voter fraud. That prong has failed. After exhaustive effort, the Department of Justice discovered virtually no polling-place voter fraud, and its efforts to fire the U.S. attorneys in battleground states who did not push the voter-fraud line enough has backfired.

And this is why the investigations will be as slow as molasses. The Republicans do not want this criminal enterprise to really get into the consciousness of the electorate. They would rather it remain the stuff of he said-she said, the sturm und drang of modern politics. The truth is that this was a systematic effort to disenfranchise Democrats.

UPDATE: President Pissypants, on Rove:

Q How central a role did Rove play in the U.S. attorney business? That's what everybody wants to know. Was he the main guy drawing up the list?

THE PRESIDENT: Just look at the facts as they've come out.

Q It's unclear.

THE PRESIDENT: There has been plenty of testimony, plenty of hearings, plenty of statements. And one thing is for certain, that there was no wrongdoing done. And --

I believe it's cut off because the interviewer's head exploded and Bush was unsure of whether or not to continue.