Free Republic

MILWAUKEE - Five Democratic presidential campaign workers, including the sons of a congresswoman and a former mayor, were wrongly implicated in Election Day vandalism by national political operatives from their own party, defense attorneys argued at their trial Tuesday. Prosecutors accused the five of slashing 40 tires on get-out-the-vote vans at a Republican campaign office in the early hours before the Nov. 2, 2004, election, causing more than $5,000 in damage.

Fourteen months after John Kerry narrowly carried Wisconsin in the 2004 presidential election amidst allegations of voter fraud, five campaign workers for the Kerry-Edwards campaign team are set for trial Tuesday in Milwaukee on felony charges of damage to property.The "Milwaukee Five” is charged with slashing 40 tires on 25 separate Republican vehicles on the morning of the 2004 presidential election. The vehicles were rented by the Wisconsin Republican Party to transport less-mobile voters to the polls on Election Day. In total, the vandals disabled 25 percent of the Republican Party’s "Get Out the Vote” fleet. The defendants include Sowande...