Democrats accuse voter registration group of fraud

Kirsten Searer

Wednesday, Oct. 13, 2004 | 11:04 a.m.

Questions are surfacing about a group -- funded in part by the Republican National Committee -- that is accused of trying to stop Democrats from registering to vote.

Voters Outreach of America, sometimes called America Votes, registered voters in both Reno and Las Vegas in recent weeks on behalf of the RNC.

Democratic groups have complained for weeks that canvassers working for Voters Outreach have turned away Democrats who want to register, sometimes telling people they are only paid to register Republicans.

And, on Tuesday night, Channel 8 Eyewitness News reported that a former employee of the company, Eric Russell, registered Las Vegas residents in both parties, but his boss hassled him when he tried to submit Democratic forms.

"We caught her taking Democrats out of my pile, handed them to her assistant and he ripped them up right in front of us," Russell told Channel 8. "I grabbed some of them out of the garbage and she tells her assistant to get those from me."

Voters Outreach could not be reached for comment.

Russell gave a few of the destroyed forms to Channel 8, which verified that the voters were not registered.

Tuesday night was the deadline to register for the Nov. 2 general election.

Yier Shi, a spokesman for the Republican National Committee, confirmed that Voters Outreach of America contracts with the RNC to register voters in the final weeks before the election.

However, he said, the RNC does not encourage the company to destroy forms from Democrats. Republican party officials in each state typically check in randomly with the group to ensure it is operating on the up-and-up, Shi said.

"We put in mechanisms to check for fraud and legal training for those who we hire," Shi said. "Anybody who's found to have acted inappropriately is fired."

The RNC put out a statement this morning that said it had a "zero-tolerance policy for anything that smacks of impropriety" and said anyone participating in voter fraud should be prosecuted.

According to state law, people can be hired to circulate voter registration forms, but they cannot be paid by the form.

State law clearly states that county clerks and other official government agencies cannot refuse to register someone because of their party affiliation. But the rules are looser for non-governmental employees who register voters, said Dan Burk, the Washoe County registrar.

Burk said he plans to ask the FBI or Nevada state officials to look into between 50 and 75 voter registration forms he received from the group that, he said, were clearly forged.

The Channel 8 report said Russell had gone to the Las Vegas office of the FBI to show agents the forms he had.

Special Agent David Schrom, FBI spokesman, said that the Las Vegas and Reno offices of the FBI have not received any information on the alleged registration fraud.

"We're aware of the press report, but that's it," Schrom said this morning. "We have not received any information from an alleged victim.

"We have no information whatsoever."

Schrom said that at this point there is no investigation into the allegations made in a report by Channel 8.

Schrom said that the Washoe County registrar of voters has contacted the Reno office of the FBI about the Channel 8 report, but Reno agents, like their Las Vegas counterparts, have received no information beyond the television news story.

The forms included invalid addresses and phone numbers, and many were filled out in the same handwriting, Burk said. Voters Outreach also gave him about 200 other obviously fraudulent forms that the group said were given to them by canvassers.

Burk said he has also received complaints from people who were told by canvassers of Voters Outreach that they had to register at least four Republicans an hour or they could lose their jobs.

Clark County Registrar Larry Lomax said his office also has received similar complaints about Voters Outreach.

"A lot of complaints I get about that group are that people go to register and they feel they are being pressured to register as Republican," he said. "People don't like that kind of pressure. I've been told that people get paid only for every Republican they register, so that would explain why they're so pushy."

Michelle Marto, a communications director for America Coming Together, a Democratic advocacy group, said she was approached in Reno by an employee of Voters Outreach who asked her if she supported Bush or Kerry.

"I said, 'Well I'm kind of undecided,' " Marto said. "And his line was, 'Well, are you registered? Because I'm registering Republicans today.' "

The employee then told her he would be bumped to a higher salary level if he registered eight or more Republicans in a day, Marto said.

Lisa Hall, a canvasser who works for America Coming Together in Las Vegas, said she heard a similar line from a canvasser at a Las Vegas Albertson's.

"He told me if he starts to talk to a person and they say they're for Bush, he asks if they would like to register," she said.

If the person said they support Kerry, Hall said, the canvassers would politely tell them to have a nice day without offering to help them register.

America Coming Together has a clear Democratic bias and typically trolls for voters in Democratic districts. But Las Vegas spokesman Kevin Griffis said about 14 percent of the voters the group has registered are Republican, and about 15 percent are non-partisan.

Andres Ramirez, state director of Voices for Working Families, another group registering voters, said he sent several of his canvassers to a training session conducted by Voters Outreach. They were told they could earn $500 for every 80 Republicans they register, Ramirez said.

The stories are compatible with other accounts about Voters Outreach, including an August article in The Charleston Gazette in Charleston, W.Va.

Another group called America Votes also has been registering people in Nevada, but state director Carrie Sandstedt said the two groups are not affiliated. Sandstedt said her group leans Democratic but registers people from all parties.

"Our members take voter registration fraud very seriously," she said.