Leahy, Kennedy Urge AG
Gonzales To Vigorously Pursue Voter Suppression Allegations In So.
California
… Leading Judiciary
Democrats Direct DOJ To Provide Report On Federal Investigation Before
November Elections
WASHINGTON (Friday, October 20) --
Senators Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) sent the
following letter to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales Friday seeking a
full report from the Department of Justice on its investigation into
allegations of voter suppression targeting Latino citizens in Southern
California.
Leahy, the ranking Democratic member of the
Committee, and Kennedy,
a senior member of the panel, sent the letter following news reports
that registered voters in Orange County, California,
were being warned they could be jailed or deported if they voted in
November. The California Attorney General’s office is also
investigating the matter.
Longtime civil rights champions in Congress,
Leahy and Kennedy led efforts in the 109th
Congress to
reauthorize key provisions of the Voting Rights Act.
Below is the text of the letter, followed by
relevant news articles. A pdf version of the letter is available upon
request.
# # #
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October 20, 2006
The Honorable Alberto Gonzales
Attorney General
United States Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20530
Dear Attorney General Gonzales:
We are deeply concerned by recent news reports
describing the use of voter suppression techniques targeting Latino
citizens in southern California in the mid-term elections. We enclose
some of those accounts. Registered voters in Orange County, California,
apparently are being warned in letters that they could be jailed or
deported if they vote in the November election. Although in press
reports Republican candidate Tan Nguyen acknowledges that an employee in
his campaign was involved in sending out the controversial letter, he
claims to have no personal knowledge of the letter. According to a
Los Angeles Times article of October 19, 2006, however, Orange
County Republican Chairman Scott Baugh states that "representatives of
the Huntington Beach mail house that produced the letter told him that
Nguyen was directly involved with the letter, calling and asking that it
be sent out as soon as possible." The California Attorney General has
launched an investigation into this matter. We ask that you send us and
the Senate Judiciary Committee a written response detailing the
immediate actions being taken by the Department to investigate this
matter, prosecute those responsible, and notify naturalized citizens in
Orange County of their right to vote.
Our specific concern is that a letter, written
in Spanish and sent to an unknown number of Latinos in Orange County,
was distributed with the clear purpose of keeping voters from the polls
on the basis of their race or ethnicity. According to press reports,
the letter states that “if . . . you are an emigrant, voting in a
federal election is a crime that can result in incarceration, and
possible deportation . . . .” The letter also states that “the U.S.
government is installing a new computerized system to verify names of
all newly registered voters who participate in the elections in October
and November. Organizations against emigration will be able to request
information from this new computerized system.”
During the recent reauthorization of the
Voting Rights Act, the 109th Congress acknowledged that our
nation has a long and unfortunate history of imposing barriers to voting
rights, particularly with regard to racial, ethnic, language, and other
minorities. Although many of the most blatant vote suppression tactics
of the Jim Crow era have ended, our Committee received an abundance of
evidence during the Voting Rights Act hearings documenting that more
subtle and sophisticated vote suppression tactics persist. By
reauthorizing the Voting Rights Act, the Congress reaffirmed our
nation’s commitment to eliminating all vestiges of voter intimidation,
oppression, and suppression – whether overt or subtle.
This matter demonstrates the urgent need for
vigorous enforcement of our nation’s civil rights laws. As you know, we
have previously expressed concerns regarding the current priorities of
the Civil Rights Division and whether those priorities are aligned with
recent trends away from vigorous civil rights enforcement. We remain
concerned about a reported a sharp decline in the number of traditional
civil rights cases filed by the Division under this Administration,
particularly in the area of voting rights.
Because our nation is less than three weeks
away from an important election, the Justice Department must conduct a
thorough, complete, and speedy investigation into this matter. We
request that you provide us with your report on or before October 27,
2006.
Sincerely,
PATRICK LEAHY
Ranking Member
United States Senator
EDWARD KENNEDY
United States Senator
cc: Chairman Arlen Specter
Rep. Loretta Sanchez
# # # # #
Los Angeles Times
GOP Worker Fired for Role in Latino Voter
Intimidation
By Mai Tran, Jennifer Delson and Christian
Berthelsen
Times Staff Writers
1:34 PM PDT, October 19, 2006
Republican
congressional candidate Tan Nguyen acknowledged today that an employee
in his campaign was involved in sending out a letter intended to
suppress Latino voter turnout in Orange County in next month's election,
but said he had no knowledge of it and that the employee has been fired.
The disclosure came one day after the state attorney general's office
began focusing on Nguyen's campaign as the source of the letter. At the
same time, Republican officials today distanced themselves from Nguyen,
with several calling for him to bow out of his underdog campaign to
unseat Democratic Rep. Loretta Sanchez of Garden Grove.
Nguyen has hired a lawyer and said that he expected to meet with
investigators from the state attorney general's office today.
Addressing questions about the letter for the first time, Nguyen said
his office manager "took it upon herself to allow our database to be
used to send out the letter."
"It was disseminated without my authorization or approval," he said.
The office manager, whose name was not released, had been working for
Nguyen since the campaign office was opened. Nguyen said she had access
to the database of Democratic voters that he purchased to send out
mailers to 73,000 households. He said he did not know who wrote the
letter, which was in Spanish.
"People are pointing fingers, saying that I did it and that's going to
get cleared," Nguyen said. "I want to get the truth out so people can
vote for candidates for the right reasons."
In an interview today, Orange County GOP Chairman Scott Baugh said
representatives of the Huntington Beach mail house that produced the
letter told him that Nguyen was directly involved with the letter,
calling and asking that it be sent out as soon as possible.
Today, a host of Republicans called on Nguyen to drop out of the race.
Baugh, who called the letter "reprehensible and stupid," said the
party's executive committee voted unanimously to ask Nguyen to withdraw
from the race.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has called the letter "a despicable act of
political intimidation and a hate crime."
Nguyen said he will not withdraw.
"We're winning and we're going to win," he said.
Also today, the owner of the mail house, Mailing Pros, acknowledged that
his firm sent out the mailers and that he spoke with investigators from
the attorney general's office.
He declined to discuss details of his talk with the agents but said
Nguyen was not the person he dealt with. He would not identify the
person.
"The only thing I can say is that the client involved in this is a
one-shot customer," Christopher West said. "I haven't seen the person
before, and I guess it's unlikely I will see them again."
Nguyen has made halting illegal immigration part of his campaign against
Sanchez, who is Orange County's only Democratic member of Congress.
In a fast-moving examination that began just days after the letters were
mailed, sources said investigators estimated that the letter was mailed
to 14,000 Democratic voters in central Orange County.
The letter, which purports to be from a Huntington Beach-based group,
warns that immigrants will not be permitted to vote in the election. It
also warns that the state has developed a tracking system that will
allow the names of Latino voters to be handed over to anti-immigrant
groups.
"You are advised that if your residence in this country is illegal or
you are an immigrant, voting in a federal election is a crime that could
result in jail time," the letter, written in Spanish, says.
The information in the letter is false. Immigrants who become
naturalized citizens, such as Schwarzenegger, can vote. An illegal
immigrant who voted could be subject to deportation and jail. The
letter's assertion that the state had developed a computer system that
would make it easy to track down immigrants and illegal residents is
also false.
Until now, the campaign for the 47th Congressional District had
generated little notice. Though it has historically been a competitive
seat, Sanchez is expected to cruise to reelection. Democrats hold a
5-percentage point voter registration advantage, despite a large number
of decline-to-state voters. Latinos make up 35% of registered voters in
the district; Asians make up 18%.
Nguyen is "not popular with the Republican Party down there," said Allan
Hoffenblum, a longtime Republican consultant and publisher of the
California Target Book, an insiders guide to handicapping political
races. "Nobody seems to be paying any attention to it."
The district partly overlaps with the 34th state Senate District, where
Supervisor Lou Correa, a Democrat, is locked in a tough election battle
with former Assemblywoman Lynn Daucher, a Republican.
The stationary the controversial letter was written on resembles that of
the California Coalition for Immigration Reform, a group that advocates
tightening the border. The group's founder, Barbara Coe, said she did
not know the "Sergio Ramirez" who supposedly signed the letter.
She said she did not authorize it and was unaware of anyone in her group
who might have. Coe said two investigators from the attorney general's
office questioned her Wednesday.
Investigators "asked if I knew Loretta Sanchez," Coe said. "I said I
know of her. I told them it's been a tried and failed relationship."
San Francisco
Chronicle
Intimidating voting
letter to SoCal Hispanics investigated
- By PETER PRENGAMAN, Associated Press
Writer
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
They've
been naturalized U.S. citizens for nearly 20 years, but Benny Diaz says
he and his wife felt intimidated when they each received a letter over
the weekend warning that some immigrants could be jailed or deported for
voting next month.
The
letter, written in Spanish and sent to an unknown number of Hispanics in
Orange County, also says the government has developed a computer system
to track down the names of immigrant voters.
"A lot
of Latino families have called me to say they ripped up the letter
because they felt so insulted," said Diaz, 49, who is originally from
Peru. His wife, Nellie, is from Mexico.
Diaz is
running for a seat on the Garden Grove City Council, and he believes the
letter could scare many new citizens away from the polls.
"We
spend a lot of money to communicate with Latino voters, but do you think
they are going to come out now?" he asked.
It's
unclear who sent the letter. Meanwhile, authorities say they are
investigating, adding those responsible could be charged with a felony.
"Why
send something like this?" said state Sen. Gloria Romero, D-Los Angeles.
"The intention is clearly to shed fear and intimidation, and ultimately
suppress a vote that is critical in the elections."
In a
letter Tuesday to state Attorney General Bill Lockyer, Gov. Arnold
Schwarzenegger called the letters "racist" and "despicable," and argued
the perpetrators should be tried for a hate crime.
Lockyer
spokesman Nathan Barankin said the letter was "something we are
investigating aggressively right now."
The
sender could face as much as three years in state prison, he said.
Ana
Maria Patino, a lawyer representing the Diaz family, said families in
Santa Ana and Anaheim had also received letters. She said they were
being collected and handed over to authorities.
The
FBI's criminal division in Los Angeles obtained a copy of the letter
Tuesday and was reviewing it, said Special Agent Kenneth Smith, a bureau
spokesman.
The
note's letterhead resembles that of the California Coalition for
Immigration Reform, an anti-illegal immigration group based in
Huntington Beach, and contains the signature Sergio Ramirez.
The
group's founder, Barbara Coe, told the Los Angeles Times she did not
know anyone named Sergio Ramirez, adding she did not authorize the
letter and was unaware of anyone in her group who did. Over the last
several days, Coe said, she has taken dozens of calls from Orange County
Hispanics who received a letter.
It "puts
a shadow on our credibility, that we would target certain people who
might be citizens of our country," she said.
She did
not immediately return calls Tuesday from The Associated Press.
Coe's
group was investigated by the FBI in the late 1990s because members held
signs near polls stating only citizens can vote.
The
letter is correct in saying only immigrants who are naturalized U.S.
citizens can vote, but many of its other contentions are false.
It also
contains several grammatical errors and reads like a literal translation
from English to Spanish, suggesting it was not written by a native
Spanish speaker.
"Be
advised that the government of the United States is installing a new
computer system to verify the names of all registered voters ...
Anti-immigration organization can ask for information from this new
computer system," the letter states.
John
Trasvina, interim president and general counsel for the Mexican American
Legal Defense and Education Fund, suggested the letter might have a
backlash effect.
"A lot
of people will get angered by this and say, 'No you can't take away my
right to vote,'" said Trasvina.
New York Times
October 18, 2006
California Letter Investigated for Warning
to Immigrants
By JESSE McKINLEY
SAN
FRANCISCO, Oct. 17 — Federal and state authorities are trying to
determine who sent a letter to some Latinos in Southern California that
falsely suggested that it would be a crime for immigrants to vote in the
coming election.
The
letter, written in formal, sometimes clumsy Spanish and signed “Sergio
Ramirez,” was mailed last week to an undetermined number of people with
Spanish surnames in Orange County, the authorities said. It advised
recipients that “if you’re an immigrant, voting in a federal election is
a crime that can result in incarceration,” or deportation.
While
illegal immigrants are barred from voting, legal immigrants who have
become citizens are permitted to do so.
The
letter also stated that the federal government had installed a computer
system to verify the names of new registered voters who vote in October
and November and that anti-immigration groups would be able to access
that information. Election Day is Nov. 7, but early voting is allowed
Oct. 20-29 in Orange County.
Cynthia Magnuson, a spokeswoman for the Justice Department, which along
with the California attorney general’s office is investigating the
letter’s source, said there was no such database.
“The
letter contains false information,” Ms. Magnuson said.
The
letter was printed on stationery labeled with the name of the California
Coalition for Immigration Reform, a strident anti-illegal-immigration
group whose Web site features a video on how illegal immigrants bring
disease to the United States.
But
Barbara Coe, the group’s leader, told The Los Angeles Times, which first
reported the letter on Tuesday, that her group had not sent or
authorized it, and that she did not know a Sergio Ramirez. On Tuesday,
Ms. Coe did not return repeated phone calls and e-mail seeking comment.
Some
Latino leaders expressed doubts on Tuesday about Ms. Coe’s denial and
said they suspected the letter was part of a concerted, long-term effort
on the part of groups like hers to intimidate voters.
“They’re taking as much action as they can to make the lives of Latinos
as miserable as possible,” said Brent Wilkes, the national executive
director of the League of United Latin American Citizens, a civil rights
group.
Gov.
Arnold Schwarzenegger called the letter racist and urged Bill Lockyer,
the California attorney general, to prosecute those responsible with a
hate crime. A collection of other civil rights groups also called on
Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales to investigate the letter as a
violation of federal voting laws.
Nathan Barankin, a spokesman for Mr. Lockyer, said his office had been
alerted to the letter on Monday morning, after a weekend in which Latino
leaders fielded calls from outraged constituents.
“They
could be naturalized citizens or they could be fourth-generation
Californians,” Mr. Barankin said of the recipients. “What we do know is
that some of the recipients of this letter are legal and longtime
registered voters in California.”
Mr.
Barankin said the letter could have violated two California laws. One
bans the use of coercion or intimidation in an effort to prevent someone
from voting; the other makes it illegal to knowingly challenge a
person’s right to vote on fraudulent and spurious grounds.
It
was unclear, Mr. Barankin said, how many of the letters were
distributed, but his office expected more complaints.
“We’re going to determine who sent it, and why they sent it and then
from that, if there’s enough evidence to prosecute,” Mr. Barankin said.
Orange County, between Los Angeles and San Diego, has seen a substantial
increase in its Latino population over the last two decades. A 2005
estimate by the Census Bureau reported that nearly one in three Orange
County residents was of Latino or Hispanic origin.
Representative Loretta Sanchez, a Democrat from Garden Grove, in
northern Orange County, said that she had heard from a handful of
constituents in her district who received a letter, and that she feared
it could scare off first-time voters.
“Santa Ana and Anaheim are the new Ellis Island of the United States,”
Ms. Sanchez said, mentioning two Orange County cities with large Latino
populations. “New people are becoming citizens every day, and who knows
the sophistication level when they get a letter like this?”
But
others thought the letter would have little effect.
“I
think Latino voters are astute enough not to be intimidated,” said John
Trasviņa, the interim president and general counsel for the Mexican
American Legal Defense and Educational Fund in Los Angeles. “And they’ve
seen the same tactics used against them in the recent past as well as
the farther ago past. And they won’t take it.”
San Diego Union Tribune
Orange Co. candidate denies sending
threatening letter to Hispanic voters
By Peter Prengaman
ASSOCIATED PRESS
11:14 a.m. October 19,
2006
LOS
ANGELES – A Republican congressional candidate said Thursday that he was
not personally involved in sending a letter warning Hispanic immigrants
they could go to jail or be deported if they vote next month, a mailing
that prompted a state investigation.
“I did not do this. I did
not approve of any letter,” Tan D. Nguyen, the GOP challenger to
Democratic U.S. Rep. Loretta Sanchez, told The Associated Press.
The investigation is
focused on Nguyen's campaign, according to a law enforcement official
who spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to
publicly discuss it. The Los Angeles Times and The Orange
County Register also indicated the Nguyen's campaign was the target.
Nguyen said he believed an
employee in his office might have used his voter data base to send out
the letter without his knowledge. He said that employee has been
“discharged.”
The letter, written in
Spanish and mailed last week to an estimated 14,000 Democratic voters in
central Orange County, tells recipients: “You are advised that if your
residence in this country is illegal or you are an immigrant, voting in
a federal election is a crime that could result in jail time.”
In fact, immigrants who
are naturalized U.S. citizens can legally vote.
It is illegal to threaten
or intimidate voters, though, and the complaints about the letters that
began surfacing this week prompted state and federal investigations.
“I will do whatever I can
do to encourage all citizens in this district to vote,” Nguyen said. He
said he was cooperating with authorities and promised more details of
what happened during a news conference Friday.
In an interview Thursday
morning, Sanchez told the AP she had never spoken to Nguyen because her
campaign didn't see him as a threat to her re-election.
She said she didn't know
who did it, but if it was Nguyen, it was especially troubling that the
culprit might have been an immigrant. Nguyen immigrated to the U.S. from
Vietnam as a child. His campaign Web site says he opposes illegal
immigration.
“If it is in fact this
guy, the most disgusting and saddest thing about it is that it comes
from another immigrant,” said Sanchez, who was born in the U.S. to
Mexican parents. “These communities have spent years trying to get
naturalized immigrants to vote.”
The owner of Huntington
Beach-based Mailing Pros, Christopher West, told The Orange County
Register that he was hired to do the mailings but didn't know what they
said and didn't know any laws were being broken when the mailer was
sent. He said he gave investigators the name of the person who hired
him.
“I'm the one that
processed it, and I don't read Spanish,” West said. “Until the
investigator read it to me, I didn't know the content.”
Scott Baugh, chairman of
the Orange County Republican Party, condemned the letter as “an
obnoxious, grotesque piece of work.”
“Regardless of who did it
– Republican or Democrat – if it's a crime, then whoever did it should
be prosecuted,” Baugh said.
The note's letterhead
resembles that of an anti-illegal immigration group, California
Coalition for Immigration Reform, but group leader Barbara Coe said she
told investigators for the attorney general's office Wednesday that her
group didn't authorize the letter and she didn't know who sent it.
“The letterhead was
altered and I've never head of any Sergio Ramirez,” the name signed to
the letter, Coe said.
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