Has the New Hampshire phone-jamming case finally come to a quiet end?
Federal prosecutors have dropped their case against former regional NRSC official James Tobin in connection with a GOP plot to jam the phone lines of the New Hampshire Democratic party on Election Day 2002, reports the Associated Press.
Tobin had been acquitted of involvement in the plot — for which two GOP consultants have served jail time — but was being tried on new charges of lying to investigators. A court dismissed those charges, and last week an appeals court rejected prosecutors’ appeal.
Almost from the start, there has been evidence of White House involvement in the scheme. Phone records show Tobin made 24 calls to the office of Ken Mehlman, then the White House’s political director, around Election Day 2002, and the RNC has spent hundreds of thousands on Tobin’s defense. Mehlman has denied that any of the calls concerned the scheme.
And New Hampshire Democratic congressman Paul Hodes doesn’t view the matter as closed. “New Hampshire’s citizens deserve a full airing of what transpired in 2002,” said Hodes said in statement. “Granite Staters deserve fair elections and hopefully this case will serve as a warning to those who would seek to tamper with New Hampshire’s electoral process.”
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