Rotika: ACORN analysis found voter registration fraud

INDIANAPOLIS – Secretary of State Todd Rokita says his office has found evidence of “multiple criminal violations, including possible state and federal racketeering laws” in connection with fraudulent voter registration applications filed in Lake County.

Rokita wrote a letter to federal, state and local prosecutors last week asking them to open a criminal investigation into registration applications filed by the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN.

Of the 1,438 voter registration applications Rokita’s office investigated, 61 percent had problems such as incomplete data or indications of fraud or forgery.

Thirty percent of the applications included information that was obviously incorrect, incomplete or illegible, he said.

The majority of the problem applications originated in and around the city of Gary in far northwestern Indiana, the letter said. Rokita said his office’s preliminary investigation found that ACORN’s northwest Indiana branch violated election laws.

“This is a fraud perpetrated on all of the people of Indiana because fraudulent registrations are the first step in diluting the voice of honest voters and rendering an inaccurate tally on Election Day,” wrote Rokita, a Republican.

The Associated Press could not leave a message for the ACORN office in Gary because a voice mail box was full, so the AP e-mailed the group seeking comment.
Jess Ordower, Midwest director of ACORN, has said he believes his group is being targeted because some politicians don’t want that many low-income people having a voice.

Gary, a Lake County city which overwhelmingly supported Sen. Barack Obama in the May primary, is 85 percent black. Obama needs a strong showing in Lake County if he is to win Indiana, which no Democratic presidential candidate has done since Lyndon Johnson in 1964.

ACORN officials have also said the group identifies potentially problematic voter registration applications, but that state law requires the group to turn them in anyway.
Rokita said that law exists “to prevent ‘lost’ applications of those thought to be supporters of an opposing party candidate, for example.”

But he said the law does not protect ACORN from laws making it a felony to turn in false applications.

“Simply put, complying with the law to submit legitimate applications does not allow ACORN officials to evade the law against knowingly submitting fraudulent applications,” Rokita wrote.

Rokita has previously asked for a criminal investigation into the registration applications.

A Deputy Indiana Attorney General rejected his previous request, but senior law enforcement officials have told the AP that the FBI was investigating ACORN.