GOP Voter Fraud Bigwig Complained to White House about Canned U.S. AttorneyThe case for Republican voter fraud complaints being at the root of yet another U.S. attorney firing just got a lot stronger.
The U.S. attorney here is Todd Graves, the U.S. attorney for Kansas City who was fired in January of last year. And Murray Waas, reporting for National Journal, reports that Mark “Thor” Hearne, the GOP operative behind the American Center for Voting Rights — the conservative organization that served to spread allegations of widespread voter fraud and push voter ID laws as the cure — had complained to the White House and senior officials in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division about Graves’ lack of commitment to the cause:
In the case involving ACORN, Hearne had urged the Justice Department long before the election to investigate the activist organization and similar groups that registered Democrats. When Hearne came to believe that the U.S. attorney for western Missouri, Todd Graves, was not taking seriously allegations that ACORN workers were registering people who did not qualify to vote, he took his complaints to senior officials in Justice’s Civil Rights Division and to the White House, according to a former Justice official and a private attorney who worked with Hearne. The private attorney said in an interview that Hearne boasted to him about having discussions with administration officials who wanted Graves replaced. The White House declined to comment on any of its discussions with Hearne.
Waas notes that there’s no direct evidence that Hearne’s complaints led to Graves’ dismissal. But Graves’ case is starting to look a lot like two others that have drawn plenty of suspicion: David Iglesias of New Mexico and John McKay of Washington. In both those cases, state Republicans’ brought their complaints to the White House and the leadership at the Justice Department. In Iglesias’ case, both the president and Karl Rove himself echoed those complaints to the Justice Department.
And a complaint from Hearne would have gotten special attention. Hearne is reportedly close to Rove, and served as national election counsel for the 2004 Bush-Cheney presidential campaign.
There’s an additional fact which makes this case even more suspicious. Graves was replaced by Bradley Schlozman, a former senior political appointee at the Civil Rights Division who oversaw the voting rights section. According to Waas, Hearne brought his complaints about Graves to “senior officials in Justice’s Civil Rights Division.” These were complaints about voting cases, which means the complaints most likely went to Schlozman himself — or his right hand Hans Von Spakovsky. After Schlozman was installed in Graves’ place, he brought an indictment against four ACORN workers days before the election in 2006. So it looks a lot like Hearne got his wish.
Schlozman, remember, will appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee this coming Tuesday. That hearing promises to be very interesting.
Update: Rick Hasen has more over at the Election Law blog.