Nym90
nym90
Atlas Icon
Posts: 16,260
Political Matrix E: -5.55, S: -2.96
|
|
« on: October 15, 2004, 10:22:20 AM » |
|
CONCORD, N.H. - Democrats are accusing the Justice Department (news - web sites) of playing politics by trying to delay an inquiry into whether President Bush (news - web sites)'s New England campaign chief played a role in illegal phone-jamming on Election Day 2002.
Computer-generated calls were made to get-out-the-vote phones run by Democrats and the nonpartisan Manchester firefighters' union. More than 800 hang-up calls tied up phones for about 1 1/2 hours.
Last summer, the former executive director of the state GOP pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge and admitted paying $15,600 to a Virginia telemarketing company that hired another business to make the calls.
The state Democratic Party asked for an immediate hearing Friday to get permission to question GOP officials under oath after a last-minute Justice Department request delayed a questioning session set for Thursday.
In legal filings Thursday, Democrats said they believe Jim Tobin, the New England director of the Bush-Cheney campaign, was involved in the phone jamming. In 2002, Tobin was northeast political director for the Republican Senatorial Committee, the party operation working to elect Republicans to the Senate. He did not return a phone call seeking comment.
"The sudden cooperation between the Department of Justice (news - web sites) and the New Hampshire Republican Party strongly suggests that the Department of Justice has intervened at this late moment in an attempt to prevent a Republican Party operative from being publicly identified, disclosed and possibly removed from his position because of his alleged involvement in electoral fraud," Democrats said in a motion filed in Superior Court in Manchester.
|