Socialist Students "illegally" helping Wellstone

drudge ^ | 10/16/02

[pollwatcher]

"Send A Student To Minnesota! DSA’s national electoral project this year is the Minnesota Senate Election. Together with YDS, DSA’s Youth Section, we are mobilizing to bring young people to Minnesota. Minnesota is one of the few states that allow same day voter registration. We will therefore focus our energy on registering young Minnesotans. Wellstone will need a high percentage of young people to register and vote for him if he is to stave off the campaign that Bush, the Republicans and the Greens are waging against him. He is the Right’s Number One electoral target.

Because we are focusing on issue-based voter registration, this electoral work can be supported by tax-deductible contributions. The DSA FUND is soliciting tax-deductible contributions to support this project...."

[tickles]

oh perhaps they're not.(committing fraude that is)

they're just paying young people to come to minnesota to register young minnesotans, and stay here over the day of voting (or at least it sounds that way with te same day registration thing) and they're having people give these young people places to stay (gives them an address and a person to vouch for them) , I guess there are no young democrats in MN to do this job of getting young people in MN to register to vote and vote.

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

This is the link to the FoxNews story on this topic:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,65849,00.html

Tax Deductible $ to Get Out the Vote The Democratic Socialists of America, which bill themselves as the largest socialist organization in the country, is raising tax-deductible money to send young people in the state of Minnesota where they can take advantage of same-day registration to vote for liberal incumbent Paul Wellstone. Under the heading, "Send a student to Minnesota ," the group's Web site says, "Wellstone will need a high percentage of young people to register and vote for him." But it adds, "Because we are focusing on issue-based voter registration, this electoral work can be supported by tax-deductible contributions."

=================================================

Here's Rush Limbaugh's Column on this topic (love Rush's headline! Woo hoo!):

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_101602/content/stack_b.guest.html

Socialists Rally For Senator Welfare, Fraud Abounds

October 16, 2002

Socialists are letting no law stand in their way in their effort to re-elect ulta[sic]-liberal, comfort-Saddam Senator Paul Welfare – affectionately known by President Bush as "Pablo." They're so worried about his poll numbers, that they began a secret campaign to bus liberal college students in to register to vote that day!

These are literally socialists, folks. These are the same people who see the horrors of the USSR, National Socialism and Mao, and think that if geniuses like them were in charge, they'd have done better. The Democratic Socialists of America (one of the biggest oxymorons I've ever heard) say that their plan to send some two dozen young people to Minnesota this month to help Wellstone "has been misinterpreted."

Yet their intentions couldn't be clearer: to break the law. On their website they write, "We are mobilizing to bring young people in Minnesota. Minnesota is one of the few states that allows same-day voter registration. We will, therefore, focus our energy on registering young people. Wellstone will need a high percentage of young people to register and vote for him."

I rolled our instant-classic EIB parody of the Torricelli-McAuliffe Tours in honor of this story and the one on voter fraud in South Dakota. These guys are in a panic. Everything they've tried has failed. They have no ideas. They can't give a single reason to vote for them – only reasons to vote against Republicans. Now they've been forced to join up with the president because he's so respected and right on.

(See: Tom & Dick Following Carville Memo Daily). They're even mouthing the language of tax cuts! This is uncanny to me. They're really off their game.

Listen to Rush...

(...discuss the desperate state of the Democratic Party in America today)

[gore_sux]

1. Why do they need to "SEND" "STUDENTS" to Minnesota? Why can't they recruit students and/or non-students WITHIN the state for a registration-help effort? Why do they have to be students? What help do people need with registering in Minnesota? You just have to show up for God's sake!

2. Why did they change "REGISTER YOUNG PEOPLE"(in the original text) to "REGISTER YOUNG MINNESOTANS" in the ad?

3. "We are mobilizing to bring young people to Minnesota..."
"We will therefore focus our energy on registering young people..."
"Wellstone will need a high percentage of young people to register and vote for him..."

BRING-REGISTER-VOTE...not much of a leap for me

4. How can the DSA advocate a vote for Paul Wellstone if they are a tax exempt organization?

5. Why should it matter that Minnesota is a same-day registration state unless they were going to abuse same day registration and our non-ID vouching system? Why can't they help people register in states without same day registration?

[tickles]

I think a speical session is in order (or are they still up there) the vouch thing needs to be changed so that the voucher signs an afidavite and then if the vouchee is found to be registered and have voted absentee in another state they both get prosecuted.

[terilyn]

Thanks for the links! I was telling somebody at work about this today. He's a Wellstone supporter and we've had some interesting discussions.

He said he didn't believe it and that some obscure right-wing publications were the only ones reporting it. I linked him to the St. Paul Pioneer Press story and he still wouldn't believe it...

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

This is all VERY good news, especially given the swing in the polling in favor of Wellstone after the Congressional vote on the Iraq resolution. Now let's keep the voters of MN talking (and thinking!!!!) about this until Election Day! :-)

In the meantime, round up as many family members and friends who can spare the day off on Election Day to get pollwatcher credentials from the Coleman campaign so they can get out and monitor the precincts for fraud and electioneering. Make sure to bring cell phones and even a video camera which I used in the 1998 election to tape a DEM "activist" handing out leaflets/voting cards to old people just outside an area precinct. Do it!

[terilyn]

Well those of us that have had to suffer through 12 years of Wellstone appreciate your accidental nice work!

Thank you ;)

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

Let me see what else I can find to help you educate your co-worker DEM "lemmings" :-).

Besides, what kind of argument is "only right-wing publications were reporting it"? Even if they were, does that mean the FACT that the DSA information doesn't exist? Oh puh-leeeezzzzzzzze!

[gore_sux]

Thanks for the links! I was looking for that Fox News transcript!

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

OK, from the discussion board at the StarTribune.com site talking about the 2002 Election comes this forum (I'm quoting the relevant posts here):

------------------------------------------
Chris Berg - 09:16pm Oct 15, 2002 CST (#2076 of 2129)
You can never be TOO cynical! - Scott Adams

Lewis at least tackles interesting topics. Cole just babbles for two hours. Lewis' big problem, is that he would sacrifice electability for ideology. He claims there's no such thing as a "centrist," yet it is those swing votes that get people elected.

Lewis brought up an interesting point today regarding the senate ads on Social Security. He mentioned that privatization is simply another choice you might have (you also might choose to continue with your SS withholding as it is). He then went on to say that the Democrats don't want this, because once people can make choices independent of the government, the Dems, who base their ideology on that of dependence, would have nothing to offer. I tend to agree.

He also mentioned an interesting story related to voter fraud and Wellstone. I'll let someone else who may have listened post that one.

-------------------------------------
Rip Anderson - 04:20am Oct 16, 2002 CST (#2089 of 2129)

"He also mentioned an interesting story related to voter fraud and Wellstone. I'll let someone else who may have listened post that one." -- Chris

That the National Socialist Democratic Party (or something like that) endorsed Wellstone, and that they were paying to send a lot of young socialist democrats to Minnesota for the election to "help register voters" so they could vote for Wellstone.

Lewis speculated they were really coming to make use of the lax same-day registration rules to vote multiple times for Wellstone.
------------------------------------------

Chris Berg - 05:28pm Oct 16, 2002 CST (#2124 of 2129)
You can never be TOO cynical! - Scott Adams

Lewis speculated they were really coming to make use of the lax same-day registration rules to vote multiple times for Wellstone.

Soucheray had both Secretary of State Mary Kiffmeyer and US Attorney Tom Heffelfinger on his show today discussing it. Apparently, though Heffelfinger couldn't disclose much, there is an investigation into the possibility of these people coming into the state to fraudulently vote. The problem, according to Kiffmeyer, is that the crime has to be committed in order to prosecute.

---------------------------------
Mark Farkus - 05:50pm Oct 16, 2002 CST (#2125 of 2129)
"Live free or die"

The problem, according to Kiffmeyer, is that the crime has to be committed in order to prosecute.

Sounds like they've already committed at least one federal crime: falsifying voter registration information.

If they signed a card which said they live in voting district A when they actually live in voting district B, I believe that is a federal offense. They don't have to actually VOTE to be prosecuted for election fraud.

I believe the law pretty much implies that falsifying voter registration (with the intent to commit election fraud) carries the same weight as actually committing said fraud. At least that's the way I understand it.

[YaYa123]

"...what they're saying is that they need people from across the country to head up to Minnesota to register voters...."

Why would this organization wait until election day to import people to register voters ? This doesn't pass the make sense test.

And where would they find people to register? street corners? nursing homes? This doesn't smell right, no matter which reading you give it.

[YaYa123]

Thanks for the Memories of the New York Matron, from the 2000 presidential election: I'd almost forgotten the details:

http://secure.mediaresearch.org/news/cyberalert/2000/cyb20001114.asp

" "The ABC affiliate in Milwaukee caught Gore campaign workers handing out cigarettes to homeless residents after they had been brought to a polling place to vote."

Connie Milstein: "I’m here representing the Gore-Lieberman campaign. I’m chairman of the Major Supporters Committee."

Ross: "Connie Milstein, a major Gore supporter and the wife of a New York multimillionaire, told the station she had been asked by the Gore campaign to come to Milwaukee."

Milstein: "Wisconsin is a very key state for the Democratic Party."

Ross: "The district attorney says there is evidence that the Democratic group went to at least three homeless shelters where residents said cigarettes were used to get them to vote. Willie Jackson voted for the first time."..

Ross caught Milstein in Manhattan: "Today outside her Park Avenue home in New York, Mrs. Milstein said she had done nothing wrong."

Milstein: "Brian, let me just say one thing. I am an ordinary Park Avenue matron."

Ross: "Why were you in Milwaukee?"

Milstein: "I was there as an ordinary campaign worker."

Ross concluded: "Mrs. Milstein would not say who sent her to Milwaukee, and the Democratic Party maintains she went to the homeless shelters on her own."

[terilyn]

Great, and THANK YOU! I'll be sure to pass it along, for "Educational purposes" of course :)

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

Of course, logic and FACTS never seem to get through to the typical lemming, "feeling" DEM voter.

I'm going to continue to try to stay on top of this one as much as possible and will keep you "bumped" if I come up with anything more.

[who knows what evil?]

If the Republican Party had a clue (which they don't), they would respond to this with a 'saturation' series of radio/television PSA's reminding the public of the harsh penalties associated with voter fraud, which is a felony. A little discouragement wouldn't hurt...

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

http://www.startribune.com/stories/587/3370493.html

To-do over socialist vote drive is teapot tempest, 2 sides say
Dane Smith
Star Tribune

Published Oct 17, 2002

A conservative advocacy group has raised the specter of socialist activists from around the nation crossing the border into Minnesota to take advantage of Minnesota's liberal voting laws and helping reelect U.S. Sen. Paul Wellstone.

But leaders of both the group crying foul and the socialist group accused of planning that effort described the controversy Wednesday as a tempest in a teapot.

"My tongue was placed firmly in my cheek," said David Strom, head of the Taxpayers League of Minnesota, a group funded largely by donors to conservative Republican candidates and causes. "There are so few socialists left that they could meet in a phone booth."

Frank Llewellyn, the national director of New York-city based Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), said his group's promotion of a voter-registration drive was misconstrued by the Taxpayers League and turned into a "new sophisticated form of red-baiting."

At issue is an alarm sounded earlier this week by the league, drawing attention to a Web site advisory by the DSA that described the reelection of Wellstone as its top priority.

"We are mobilizing to bring young people to Minnesota. Minnesota is one of the few states that allow same-day voter registration," the site said.

Those words implied that members of the group were being encouraged to come in and vote illegally, Strom said. His release called it "one of the most transparent attempts to steal an election since the Daley machine ran Chicago politics." But Strom left the next sentence in the advisory off his press release: "We will therefore focus our energy on registering young people."

Llewellyn said that his group hopes to send 10 or 20 people to the state late this month to help organize support for Wellstone and that none will actually try to vote. He said his group has about 8,000 members nationwide and about 100 in Minnesota.

Jim Farrell, a spokesman for the Wellstone campaign, said Wellstone didn't know anything about the group and does not approve of any attempts to register illegally.

Farrell said the league managed to fool talk-radio hosts into talking up the story on stations in the Twin Cities "without getting its facts straight."

The brouhaha also was the subject of an item on the Drudge Report Web site.

Strom said that "even if they themselves [the socialist group] are not plotting some grand voter fraud," the league only wanted to point out that the "laws that we have make it easy to commit fraud."

Minnesota, which always ranks high in voter turnout, generally is considered one of the easiest states in which to vote. Voters must reside in the state for at least 20 days before the election, a deadline that passed on the day the league issued its press release.

If not preregistered, qualified people can vote if they show proof of their residency at the polling place or have a registered voter from that precinct vouch for their residency.

-- Dane Smith is at rdsmith@startribune.com.

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

I had to dig a bit to find it :-).... but then again, I'm good at this kind of research.

[CyberAnt]

Hmmmm? When Rush was discussing this today, I wondered if the "young people" were going to claim "student" status in order to register to vote! It would be fairly simple to manufacture school documents, and supply people to vouch for your student status.

These people are so desperate to keep their power, it's really sad!

[KSCITYBOY]

Maybe the "Redstar" will look into this, and pigs will fly.

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

http://www.kstp.com/article/view/49213/

The Eyewitness News Truth Test strikes again!
Publishing date: 10-16-2002 12:00 AM

The candidates can run but they can't hide. From the truth that is... Another controversial campaign ad gets put to the truth test. Tonight at ten on Channel 5 Eyewitness News find out what ad gets tested and whether or not it's telling the truth.

(KSTP is Minneapolis/St. Paul's Channel 5 - ABC affiliate station.)