Karl Rove had his own little experience with voter fraud.

In 2005, it was revealed that, although he claimed his 1.3 million "Homestead" was in the District of Columbia where he lives with his wife and son, he cast his vote from a two bedroom cottage in Ingram, TX.

By claiming his "homestead" as DC, he was receiving a tax write off from the DC Government. A write off only DC voters can receive.

Ingram, TX locals questioned the fact that Karl was one of the local townsfolk, and one eventually filed a voter fraud complaint with the local sheriff.

Karl was acquitted by the sheriff - but only becaue Karl could not produce a copy of the Homestead form he signed in DC. How convenient.

Read the whole sordid story, courtesy of crew here:

http://www.citizensforethics.org/press/newsrelease.php?view=85

And while your're at it, spend some time wondering why Karl is overpriced selling real estate to his former political business partners:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/5/2/10177/11404

Very nice. This is a seminal piece because it clearly draws the big picture of a national strategy to get their people in place in key swing states for the 2008 elections. It's all coming into focus now. The electoral map is looking scary bad for the GOP in the next elections. Karl knows they're going to lose big if they don't act, hence the urgency to make this happen. Too bad it's a) blowing up in their faces, and b) undermining the integrity of the justice department.

Dan: "voter fraud" in a Rovian context is very much a partisan issue precisely because it has zilch to do with actual fraud and everything to do with using the power of the Justice Department and the US Attorney's office to discourage poor and minority citizens (who tend to vote Democratic) from exercising their constitutional rights.

And to bring it all full circle, Heather Wilson of New Mexico is currently engaging in the same "homestead deduction" fraud that Rove tried. Go to

https://www.taxpayerservicecenter.com/RP_Search.jsp?search_type=Assessment

and plug in Square 0866, lot 0054.

Funny: the Constitution requires Congressmembers to reside in the states they represent (at least as of Election Day), yet Wilson has claimed this tax break -- on the basis of being a resident of DC -- going back well before November 2006.

The voter fraud thing is a weak hand for Rove and the GOP. They can suppress a few votes at the margin and in ultra close races, Florida 2000 for instance, it can be telling. Overall however it's a tiny piece of the puzzle. The biggest piece is to be poplular and now the GOP is becomming as popular as, in Cheney's case, Jeff Dahmner.

This isn't to discount this whole thing but just to put it in perspective.

The deepest foundation of modern conservatism is white American exceptualism. It will require overturning the Constitution as we know it for the white Christians to maintain their status. That is what the Bush presidency is all about. It's the first salvo. Electoral political operations liked Roves are just a rearguard action. They certainly know that they cannot win the election game going forward to mid century.

Jonas & Dan--
we've seen this supposed concern over "voter fraud" clearly in action here in Georgia. the republican legislature has been pushing hard for a Voter ID to combat potential fraud. sounds like a good idea on its face, only there is no record of this kind of fraud ever (ever!) occurring in this state. On the other hand, there has been very clear evidence of people being wrongly turned away from the polls. Even our mayor's mother was denied an absentee ballot.

Don't underestimate the power of several hundred votes.... a few thousand can be huge

Man o Man...between TPM staff, bloggers, readers/contributors, McClachty, etc. the pieces are falling together.
No wonder Bushies wanted to control the Internet.
And another piece, thanks to one of the TPM readers who I cannot remember: a plan to pass laws that explicitly deny any court redress.
http://www.committeeforjustice.org/contents/reading/092804.pdf

Bush et al are planing to not only to pack the USA, but to also the courts, make legal redress impossible.
Here you can find a database showing which judges are nominated by which President.
Bush has nominated over 300, if I did the search correctly.

..

Did Frank Luntz come up with the term of art "voter fraud" to replace the ostensible voter suppression?

Estate tax = Death tax?

I sure am glad Republicans hate politics by focus group so much.

Nothing to see here. Move along.

Maybe those "numbers" Rove was talking about before the 2006 thumpin' were due to his overestimation of his ability to steal another election by using loyal Bushies in the US attorney's offices. Rove knows the republicans can't win in a fair fight, so he finds every way he can to rig elections.
Bush is willing to go to the mat with Congress to protect Rove. That's some canine loyalty.

Shields' and Cragan's study (http://www.epluribusmedia.org/columns/2007/20070212_political_profiling.html)
showed that the biggest imbalance in voter fraud cases (4 Democrats to 1 Republican) was at the local level which does not reach the national news.

TPM should try to get their raw data and go over the cases one by one. There's a lot of stuff that no one knows about except locals. And there's an apparent pattern -- not quite a conspiracy, but the use of the law for a coordinated voter-suppression action, organized partly throught the Federalist Society and partly by the Attorney General through the "loyal Bushies" that have been appointed.

Segregation then. Segregation now. Segregation forever!

Karly, you're doing a heckuva job.

Virt:

You rightly mention the Rehnquist court's decision and its selection of Bush for president. In 2001, John Dean wrote about his role in how Nixon came to appoint William Rehnquist to the Supreme Court. It is chilling to realize the end result of Nixon's search for "strict constructionist" nominees. Dean's book on the SC - http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0743226070/findlaw-20 - and his "Worse than Watergate" are timely, truthful and terrifying.

the crime of voting while black.

The Shields and Cragan raw data are here.

The charges against Rehnquist were aired, though far from sufficiently, at the confirmation hearings when Reagan nominated him for Chief Justice. He was a straight-up racist. I remember the testimony of Blacks and Latinos who recounted how Rehnquist had accosted and then thrust a book at them. He would then declare they hadn't read well enough to vote. That's how Rehnquist made his name within the Republican Party.

Shields and Cragan:

http://www.epluribusmedia.org/columns/2007/Table%203%20Only%20Local%20Investigated.pdf

Something tells me RealID figures into this. But where?

Nixon had '72 in the bag, yet his paranoia drove him and his to break into the DNC HQ to find out what they were up to and how they were going to steal the presidential election.
And that was the little thread that was yanked on and caused the whole Nixon lie-machine to unravel.
After all the horrors that Junior, Rove, and Shooter have visited on America and its Constitution, that it might be their paranoia about a couple hundred voters in Colorado that undoes them would be SOOOOOOOO satisfying....

For Rove it is always about winning the next election. If you look ito each of these priority replacements it is either about protecting a current republican or setting themselves up to disrupt the next election cycle with "new" investigations. Is their any doubt that the new Ark USAtty would announce a renewed investigation into Clinton just after the Dem primary? Who would be better prepared for that task than the Rove aide in charge of opposition research? Why change staff in IL?- Obama.

Just to be clear.

For Rove and his ilk, voter fraud means the following:

Black people voting in their own districts

That's what they mean by voter fraud.

The fact that Rove mentioned 11 important election states, and in 9 of those states, they've replaced the USA adds adds to this whole story about 1000%

@ March 23, 2007 05:42 PM

I can add to questions about Karl Rove's finances which I posted about at the TPM Cafe.

In November 2002, the Roves bought property in Rosemary Beach for $165,000 from the Rosemary Beach Land Company. Rosemary Beach is in Walton County, Florida.

According to the records of the Walton County Clerk of the Court, Karl and Darby Rove took a mortgage on the property for $100,000 with a $1,000,000 line of credit on 11/23/2002.

The mortgagor was The Bank of Birmingham, Alabama.

The Roves satisfied the mortgage on 2/3/2003.

Why did the Roves bother to take out a mortgage for three months? I'm curious, too, if the Roves ever drew down on the $1 million line of credit.

I would not be surprised in the least if the Bank of Birmingham wrote off the mortgage or someone else paid it. Nor would I be surprised if Rove borrowed money under the line of credit that he never intends to repay himself.

Bankers can be just as crooked as the next person and Karl Rove has a lot of long time connections in Alabama where he conducted some really nasty campaigns.

"Segregation then. Segregation now. Segregation forever!"

Indeed.

What is it about people named George?

Hi, My kudos to "RAPIER"[March 23, 2007/06:15pm for raising the key issue behind Karl Rove's plans for a permanent GOP "Christian Fascist/Corporate Fascist Majority" as a precursor to a "Fascist Christian Theocracy" imposed on apathetic Americans in the next decade. Rapier is on all fours with his brilliant insight: "The deepest foundation of modern conservatism is white American exceptionalism." Rapier is also dead RIGHT in his observation that: "It will require overturning the Constitution as we know it for the white Christians to maintain their status."
Fortunately we have the Internet & the Blogosphere to challenge THEM & beat them at their own game & create our competing MEMES to the "Frank Luntz"-types who say "VOTER FRAUD" when they really mean "VOTER SUPRESSION" of "the colored ones."
Recall what the Orwellian Nazi's did to cover-up their real agenda--the elimination of World Jewry:
1. "Final Solution"--Eliminate or kill by mass murder all Jews
2. "Action"---Large-scale round up

3. "Deportation"--Resettle, removal, extermination

4. "Nach Osten"--To the death camps

5. "Rooting Out"--Extermination

6. "Operations Unit"--Killing unit

7. "Bath Installation"--Gas chamber

8. "Special Treatment"--Killing

The Bush Administration has used this "regulated language" or "Sprachregelung" to MASK/HIDE what they have been doing to our secular Democratic-Constitutional Republic of Law, from 2001-2007. And Rove & Company are planning to steal another Presidental Election in 2008, with their campaign vs. so-called "VOTER FRAUD"/rigged electronic voting machines & other Nixonian "dirty tricks" like "swiftboating"--if we of the "Vital Center" let THEM get away with it AGAIN.
Sinclair Lewis warned us in the 1930s: "When Fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross." Yes, my fellow members of the Vital Center--IT CAN HAPPEN HERE: A FASCIST CHRISTIAN AMERICA--because it is. Just turn on FOX & see "the pods growing." Very worried in Stuart, FL. George E. Lowe

Yep... Rove may be a hero to his party, but a traitor to the country.

Last time I checked, it was the United States of America, not the United States of The New Right, or Reich as it were.

Silly me, always referring to that dusty old Constitution, at least what's left of it.

Read what Joshua Marshall has to say about this, and then read yesterdays article in Salon by Sidney Blumentha. We are at a true crossroads right now in this country, and most people don’t even know why. These articles answer that question.

When Rove is cornered is when he is the most dangerous. Right now Karl Rove should be considered a very dangerous man.

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/

http://www.salon.com/opinion/blumenthal/2007/03/22/attorneys/

We are starting to see how the common thread runs through some districts where there doesn't appear to have been any obvious reason to target the sitting US Attorney -- Nevada, Michigan.

Its also worth noting that they installed the lawyers from the Civil Rights Division in SDFla and WDMo as "interim" US Attys. The one in Florida (Acosta) was later confirmed by the Senate, but in Missouri they appear to have used the Patriot Act provision right about the time it was enacted, in March 2006, to end-run the Senate. (From the website of the US Atty for WDMo: "Bradley J. Schlozman was appointed to serve as the United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri under an Attorney General Appointment on March 23, 2006.")

The nearly yearlong investigation into voter fraud in 2004 has yielded no evidence of a broad conspiracy to try to steal an election, U.S. Attorney Steve Biskupic said Monday.

He predicted that perhaps "a couple of dozen" isolated cases of suspected fraud might be charged, and he said sloppy recordkeeping by election officials was a key impediment to proving such cases.

Nothing in the cases that his office has examined has shown a plot to try to tip an election, Biskupic said during a meeting with Journal Sentinel editors and reporters.

Critics had raised such fears of partisan voter fraud schemes in the election aftermath. But Biskupic said, "I wouldn't say that at all."

He said, "We don't see a massive conspiracy to alter the election in Milwaukee, one way or another."

Biskupic, a Republican whom President Bush appointed in 2002, and Milwaukee County District Attorney E. Michael McCann, a Democrat, announced a joint effort to investigate allegations of illegal voting in January.

That followed Journal Sentinel stories on widespread problems in Milwaukee, including flawed voter counts, votes cast from invalid addresses, outdated poll lists and discrepancies between the number of ballots cast and voters listed at dozens of polling places.

The newspaper found similar problems elsewhere in the state.

Four of the 18 people accused of felonies in the investigation have been convicted, officials said Monday.

Here is the breakdown of cases:

-- Federal prosecutors have charged 14 people: 10 felons with voting illegally and four people with double voting.

Four of the felons accused of illegal voting were convicted, one was acquitted and five cases are pending, Assistant U.S. Attorney Rick Frohling said.

None of the four people charged with double voting has been convicted. Charges against one person were dismissed because of mental incompetence, one person was acquitted, one trial resulted in a hung jury, and one person who agreed initially to plead guilty now wants a trial, Frohling said.

Two of those charged with double voting were driven to several polling places in the same van, but the driver hasn't been identified, and no evidence of an organized conspiracy has been uncovered, Frohling said.

-- McCann's office has charged four people with felonies in Milwaukee County Circuit Court. Two people affiliated with the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now were charged with filing false voter registrations, and two felons were accused of illegal voting. None of those cases has been resolved.

Biskupic said he had hoped to complete his portion of the investigation this year to avoid dealing with such matters in 2006 another election year.

He said, however, that the investigation will likely spill over into next year, which will feature elections for governor, Congress and most of the state Legislature.

Biskupic declined to estimate when his part of the inquiry might be done.

Assistant District Attorney David Feiss said the district attorney's office also likely won't complete its inquiry this year.

Feiss, too, wouldn't say how much longer the investigation would last.

Biskupic said recordkeeping problems have been rampant.

He said that jurors interviewed after acquittals told prosecutors the record problems created doubt as to whether fraud had occurred.

"I don't know how you are going to prove a case when there is no paper trail," Biskupic said.

In addition, he said, it was "extremely difficult" to prove that felons ineligible to vote did so intentionally.

State law bars felons who haven't completed probation or parole from voting.

Defendants have argued that they didn't know they were barred from voting as felons, Biskupic said.

"Once people hear that argument can get them off in front of a jury, you tend to hear it more," he said.

Partisan split

The 2004 vote problems took on added significance because of the close outcome of the presidential election in Wisconsin. Democrat John Kerry beat Bush by 11,000 votes, one of the closest margins in the country.

Republicans have argued that fraud appears to be rampant in Milwaukee and that stricter controls must be enacted.

Democrats have said that the main problem is clerical shortcomings, not fraud.

That only 18 voter fraud cases have been charged doesn't mean it's not a major problem in Wisconsin, state Republican Party Chairman Rick Graber said.

"For anyone to sit back and say our election system doesn't have problems, that is just blatantly false," Graber said. "The questions raised in 2004 still haven't been answered."

He criticized Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle for vetoing legislation that would have required photo identification at the polls.

Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, a Democrat, said the results of the investigation confirm his view of a year ago, that there were only isolated instances of fraud.

"Initially, there were people painting this picture of some sort of conspiracy where there were bands (of scammers) getting together to try to defraud the system, and that obviously has not happened," Barrett said.

Barrett said he supports prosecution of lawbreakers and is critical of state officials, who said they're unlikely to complete a statewide voter list in time for April elections.

Biskupic said he worried that cases of voter fraud could spawn a partisan battle, in which the losing side perceives that the winner had some unfair advantage and becomes "more inclined to do something" illegal to even the score in the next election.

Copyright 2005, Journal Sentinel Inc. All rights reserved. (Note: This notice does not apply to those news items already copyrighted and received through wire services or other media.)

When information like Mr. Rove's little TAX switch-back deal become public knowledge, WHY IS THIS NOT PUBLICLY NOTED BY THE PRESS?

Wow! So much insight. So many blogs. TPM has hit the big time. Great job TPM!
Heads must roll.

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