Today's Seattle Times reports "6 accused of casting multiple votes"
Criminal charges have been filed against six more King County voters for allegedly casting more than one ballot under a variety of circumstances in last November's election, prosecutors said yesterday.Repeat voting is a gross misdemeanor. One of the 6 accused repeaters is Dustin S. Collings, aka Dustin S. Ocoilain, who we busted on this blog back in January. Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at June 22, 2005 12:17 AM | Email This
The problem is ferreting these multiple registrations out. Perhaps re-registration after these folks are prosecuted will give some of these LEFTIST PINHEADS pause to double register again.
I also think there are many (let's say over 133) cases of people voting other peoples ballots....students, people that moved but didn't notify Elections ...or did and the ballot went out anyway etc.)
Hopefully Republicans will at least hit the streets to attempt to validate voter registration in highly Democratic Party precindts. You really must go DOOR-TO-DOOR and make contact with each register voter. Time-consuming and takes courage. Republicans are always looking for the easy way and for someone else to do the legwork. This effort takes leadership. Where IS Chris Vance???
Posted by: Mr. Cynical on June 22, 2005 05:53 AMMaybe it's all about winning for you, but for some of us it's about integrity. I don't care if EVERY illegal voter turns out to have voted Rebublican, I much prefer that the vote be done right. While you might believe that the ends (your political liberal ideology) justifies the means (win any way you can), I prefer to stick to two principles, free, and fair elections and rule BY the people. If that makes me a loser, than it is a badge I would wear more proudly than the one you wear.
Posted by: Eyago on June 22, 2005 07:15 AMSo true, so true...
Posted by: cc on June 22, 2005 07:29 AMWe don't know how the other were cast. It is your (simple-minded) assertion that they were GOP votes.
I'm surprised your mama lets you play on the computer this early in the morning.....
Posted by: alphabet soup on June 22, 2005 07:30 AMGiven your concern for the integrity of the election process, I assume you were calling for a recount after the first count of votes had Rossi coming out on top? Or were you just prepared to let things stand at that point? Let's not fool ourselves, of course it's about winning - both parties are interested in winning.
Ralph
Posted by: Ralph on June 22, 2005 07:31 AMAnd of course the "Blogger" is our own Stefan Sharkansky. Great work, Stefan!
Posted by: Janet on June 22, 2005 07:34 AMRossi won both of them (weren't you paying attention?)
Then we had a mischievous "hand recount" which, thanks to underhandedness by the dems turned into a new, extra-legal "count". Fraudoire "won" that one.
The Republicans protested, and the judge said that, although the contest was flawed up the ying-yang, there was no specific statute in the law to address it.
Of course both parties are interested in winning - don't be a nit!
Posted by: alphabet soup on June 22, 2005 07:48 AMPROJECTION
Posted by: Bostonian on June 22, 2005 08:06 AMActaully, I was not calling one way or another regarding the first recount as it was mandated by law and thus I had no "opinion". However, with respect to winning, yes I want my candidate to prevail, just like I want the Mariner's to win, but if I discovered either of them had cheated or someone cheated on their behalf, I would turn on them in an instant, much like many Gregiore supporters have done since the election.
There are people who put political ideology above integrity. I'm not one of those.
And just so you know, I do not vote a pure Republican ticket. I don't think I have ever voted Republican down the line in any election I have voted. I mostly vote the person, and lean conservative primarily due to economic and secondarily to social policy.
Posted by: Eyago on June 22, 2005 08:08 AMIt is about intergrity, or, more accurately, the lack thereof.
Posted by: Northern Coho on June 22, 2005 08:29 AMThey fell down on the job. They didn't protect voters' rights. They left security holes all over the place and made no attempt to close them.
There are people who care about the right to vote, but it appears you are not one of them.
Posted by: Bostonian on June 22, 2005 08:37 AMAbout those "baseless charges". After this much time has passed, it seems everybody knows it went on, but there's this judge that says it couldn't be proven. Kind of like that wrestling my son watches on tv where there's all sorts of dirty moves going on behind the ref's back as he's being distracted. Then when he finally gets to turn around, amazingly the choke hold is off and the only thing left to see is a guy holding his throat. Can't prove there was an illegal hold though.
And now that we look at the polls and see how many believe Rossi won, well we all know.....
Actually, the phrase Stefan coined was "distributed vote fraud" - referring to multiple individual acts of fraud aided and abetted by an Elections office that failed (or refused) to enforce the most basic safeguards to prevent such fraud. No one at any time suggested or claimed that there was some sort of organized effort to rig the election.
Of course, when depositions for the trial were taken we learned that KCE personnel had in fact conspired with each other to falsify the absentee ballot report - not to directly influence the outcome of the election, but to cover up the fact that they had no controls in place. Not the kind of "fraud" you're referring to, but fraud just the same....
Posted by: Patrick on June 22, 2005 09:08 AMI think you'll find that long before the WA Governor's election debacle and even before Florida in 2000, it's been the Republicans who have fought for election integrity by, for example, requiring ID at the polls or proof of citizenship at registration. Dems have used the lamest excuses (Voter intimidation? Puhleeze.) to argue against even these simple checks. What does this say about the party that wants to make fraud easier?
Also, I don't believe this website ever leveled charges of "organized election fraud." It was "distributed fraud", that is, hundreds of illegal votes. This has now been demonstrated.
Posted by: Ex-WA on June 22, 2005 09:13 AMHAVE THEY EVER THOUGHT ABOUT LOOKING IN KING COUNTY COURT HOUSE...???
Posted by: Glenno on June 22, 2005 09:22 AMIf one looks back on my earlier postings, I have not been convinced that Fraud was provable in this circumstances. I still do not know if fraud actually occured. If I were the Judge sitting on the bench, I would have ruled based on State law that sufficient evidence for fraud had not been presented. But you mistake that positon for the TOTAL LACK of EVIDENCE and VALIDITY. That is where you are letting your partisan view get in the way. The thing most people froget about our legal system is that we do not rule based on justice but on LAW. This is not a trivial distiction. Justice can and often IS usurped by law in the courts. To say that because the judge did not rule in favor of the charges means the charges were baseless and that fraud did not exist is in error.
There were far too many suspicious circumstances to even suggest that there was NO fruad. In fact,there was probably more evidence in favor of fraud then excuses and explanations to the contrary. However, in our legal system, the evidence did not meet the burden of proof as set by the judge.
One thing you forget. The Judge made it clear that the burden for fixing the problem that the judge clearly DID idientify was left to the voters. That's US. That is those people on this board who are investigating the iregularities and digging for the truth.
The PERCEPTION of the integrity of the election is not sufficient. THE ACTUAL integrity IS. Those in this forum do not undermine that which was riddled with holes, it is exposing the swiss cheese of a elction system. But because you and your candidate are injured by this exposure, you choose to blame the messengers for the bad news.
The uncredited absentee votes, the provisionals put directly in the accuvote, the uncounted absentee votes, the illegal double voters, the felon votes, the falsified ballot reconciliation reports, etc WERE NOT MANUFACTERED by Sound Politics, they were DISCOVERED by them. Yet you blame SP for the lack of faith in the integrity of the election. If SP's allegations were unfounded, people would lose faith in SP, but instead, the proof is there and thus people have lost faith in the election system which has been SHOWN to be a mess.
Now, I suppose, if a doctor told you that you seemed to have an unusual spot on your skin and in his examination discovered you had skin cancer, you would blame the doctor for your condition because before he told you that you had cancer, you were feeling perfectly fine. It was simply HIS fault that you had skin cancer. He was the one who undermined the integrity of your health.
Posted by: Eyago on June 22, 2005 09:29 AMWhy is it in all the discussions about the election problems, you dems only focus on the ruling of the Judge? You seem to think that he vindicated your position that no fraud was proven and that no wrong was done because he didn't find for the Republicans. On the contrary...he did acknowledge that there was wrongdoing in the form of some 1600 illegal votes. He did comment on the culture that had prevaded the elections division. This was not a baseless lawsuit. If it was baseless the Judge would have dismissed it at the request of the Democrats following the presentation of the Republican's case. He did not.
Why is it that there are no cries from the democrats about the 118 or so legal votes cast in King County that were not counted because they were left in the machines? Aren't you the party who's State Party Chairman was sobbing on TV moaning that the Democrats only wanted every vote to be counted? Not one Democrat who has posted at this site has addressed the concerns of the Republicans over election problems that everyone knows occurred. Not one Democrat posting at this site has acknowledged that King County made our state the laughing stock when it comes to cleanly run elections. Not one Democrat posting at this site has even come close to acknowledging that they have any concerns about future elections or cleaning up the problems that exist. Not one Democrat posting at this site has done or said anything but HA HA HA...YOU LOST. I beg that you keep up your denial, continue to pat yourselves on the back for your "win", continue to ignore what the general population is saying about this election. Continue to ignore the masses and their opinions. The Democratic National Party is doing it and their stock is going down because people believe they are out of touch. Only a matter of time before the same thing happens here. So keep up the "spin" that CG won and that the Republicans never proved anything in Chelan County...Real people know the truth.
Right is right and wrong is wrong, quite apart from what you personally "feel" about it.
Posted by: Danny on June 22, 2005 11:13 AMYour points are good, but I have one small nitpick about your terminology.
I expect that a number of people who have posted here, criticizing King County, have been Democrats. Your ire should not be leveled against everyone who would call themselves a Democrat, but against a a specific group of people, who consistently post here without acknowledging any problems that need to be resolved. Just a clarification... this is not necessarily a partisan issue along party lines. Many Democrats are just as anxious for election reform as the Republican party is.
Mark
Posted by: Mark Congdon on June 22, 2005 11:30 AMNow is the time for all of us to scour the data base provided by this site and challenge any and all voters that we don't believe are legal. The SOS and county auditors won't scrub the rolls so it's up to us to report these illegals...regardless of whether they voted twice (and maybe they did???) I know of 5 who don't live/reside in my neighborhood, but whose vote counted, absentee.
Posted by: Susu on June 22, 2005 11:35 AMIn addition to actually voting twice under the surname O'Coilain, Dustin was also registered to vote under the name Dustin S. Collings at the same 77 S Washington address. (See the Shark's snapshot of the King County voter registration database.) I wonder why Dustin didn't bother voting at the polling place, too? I also wonder if he is still registered 3 times under 2 different names?
Posted by: Huckleberry on June 22, 2005 12:22 PMIn pondering all the shenanigans that marked the 2004 King County Elections, and recalling how eerily similar it all was to the 2000 election when Cantwell unseated Gorton after a recount, I wonder if Slade Gorton let us down by being too much a gentleman to challenge the integrity of the process. If Gorton in 2000 had shown the nerve that Rossi has in 2004, would the 2004 mess have been avoided?!
Posted by: Huckleberry on June 22, 2005 12:28 PMI'm so lucky (sarcasm) to live in a county where the voters have to pay to get their ballots counted. Not everyone in this county can drive to the ballot box down town to avoid paying postage.
What ever happen to "FREE" in the cliche', FREE and FAIR elections? KC demonstrated that FAIR is a myth and CC will demonstrate that FREE is a thing of the past starting with the election in September.
Yep, 40% of the voters in this county are pretty angry right now.
Posted by: kim in vancouver on June 22, 2005 12:58 PMYou are so right. There are those democrats that do see the problems irrespective of the outcome of the election contest. This is not about political parties, it is about fixing the election problems.
Posted by: csr on June 22, 2005 01:02 PMJust to be clear, Cantwell didn't just "unseat" Gorton "after a recount." She led by almost 2,000 votes before the mandatory machine recount, and by about 2,200 after the mandatory recount.
More importantly, the way Cantwell approached the election was right on. She refused to declare victory until the recount process was done and Gorton conceded. Contrast that with Rossi who, with between 1/50th and 1/10th of the victory margin of Cantwell and the recount process ongoing, argued that Gregoire should concede. He didn't want to let the state law recount process run its course. Cantwell did.
Both Cantwell and Gorton handled the ballot-counting (including the recount) honorably. Kudos to both of them for that.
Now, if anybody wants to say that Gorton should have called for a hand recount due to how close the vote was and the chance that a recount could have flipped the result, go ahead and say so. He had a right to call for the recount if he wanted it. Just as it was Gregoire's right to have a hand recount in an election that was 50 times closer than Cantwell-Gorton!
Posted by: Bluebeard on June 22, 2005 01:40 PMI wasn't watching closely enough in 2000 to know the details of the recount process, so I take you at your word that the recount was all done above board. However, I did not mean to focus this board's attention on the recount, but rather the number of illegal votes in the 2004 election. That is what we are talking about in this thread. How many of the votes in 2004 were illegal, and how many of those would not have been cast if Gorton had done more to shine a light on corruption in King County Elections in 2000?
Why is the left (or even right--or ANYONE) happy to accept a crap (elections) product & process, incompetent workers and excuses up the ying-yang?
"Any bank would envy?" Don't tell me you would not fire your bank with the same record of screw-ups. Get real. As a conservative, I would have to grumpily accept the people's mandate IF I knew the process was airtight, audited and fair. We do this with ol' Ed McMahon's sweepstakes--why is our precious right to vote not treated & protected like THOSE closely-guarded raffle millions?! Ever hear of a RD raffle scandal--probably not. Yet it's ok (to you) for an elections fiasco. "Move on," yes?
Posted by: Jimmie-howya-doin on June 22, 2005 02:20 PMDid you get any feedback on your list of possible double voters?
Also, is anyone named Rim on your list?
Posted by: Micajah on June 22, 2005 02:43 PMI wonder what - if anythng - they will do with the double-voting mail box residents? In fact - I wonder if there has been or will be any policy change with respect to our Rental Mailbox residents and King County admin building residents? Especially with the devious push to make our state all Absentee voting! I wonder if people understand that other countries can register to vote in our state - and effect our election outcomes - without worry of being caught? France probably didn't sign the EU constitution - because they know they will soon own ours if our elections continue to be so open to fraud!
Worse yet - Mexico is in a perfect position, with our current voting laws, to influence our elections! Either by illegal immigrants registering to vote here via the Motor Voter act or Mexican citizens - in their country- registering to vote here using a Rented Mailbox address as their residence!
I wish I could say I was joking or leaning toward the extreme...but.....the last election has shown us this can and does happen.
Has anyone in the legislature addressed this little problem?
Posted by: Deborah on June 22, 2005 07:22 PMMy personal peeve--illegals affecting our lives. Voting. Getting free med & schools. Sure--it's not one big "financial tsunami" but many thousands of holes in the dam. Soon, those of us who worked & "paid in" to our communities and social systems will get zip.
And lefties--listen up--illegal is illegal--voting or whatever. Don't retort with the "You like cheap produce" or "hard worker" argument. A criminal is a criminal, even if dressed in clean white garb with a charming smile. Re-register all voters now. Punish criminal voting acts. Legal citizens only should determine fellow citizens' lives. No drivers licenses for illegals--you REALLY think they will have insurance when they T-bone & total your family car?
Posted by: Jimmie-howya-doin on June 23, 2005 09:57 AM(And I hope to finish my general review of what we have learned about the phenomena this afternoon and post it on my site.)
Posted by: Jim Miller on June 23, 2005 03:03 PM