By now we have already seen multiple accounts from independent sources of serious misconduct and outright cheating by the Clinton campaign in Clark County, NV.
My own personal testimonial can be found here. Accounts by hekebolos and RunnerAAA of Clinton voters being counted at one caucus location before being herded by Clinton operatives to another nearby location can be found here and here [Full disclosure: hekebolos and RunnerAAA are my brother and his girlfriend, respectively]. Another account of irregularities was posted here by LV Pol Girl, whom I do not know and with whom I did not speak. Further accounts of cheating and bad behavior were reported by Andrew Sullivan here and here. The Obama campaign is investigating over 200 reports (and the number is actually much higher) of irregularities at the caucuses.
Today I want to share with you the stories of two more Obama volunteers who were personal witnesses to more outright cheating and bad behavior by the Clinton team--plus an email I received today from another Obama volunteer. I have omitted their names because all volunteers and organizers were told not to talk on the record--but an intrepid reporter should be able to discover their identities through a number of ways if they want more information--including by contacting me. These are accounts of:
- Obama voters being turned away from a caucus site
- Obama voters being told to fill out voter cards in the lobby until noon while Clinton supporters were invited in the caucus room--then the doors being shut on the Obama supporters because they weren't in the room
- Interference on the part of State Party officials to cheat on behalf of Clinton
- Voter cards being filled out in advance for Clinton and given to all voters, regardless of support
- Voter cards being used in the place of actual headcounts to tally votes
the Clinton campaign being allowed in to caucus sites early against the rules and setting up signs against the rules- Clinton supporters managing the voter registration process, and threatening to call the police when Obama volunteers requested equal access
- Other general bad behavior and bad faith moves by the Clinton team--and more besides.
These are not unique stories. Similar stories were told to me directly by many, many volunteers over the course of two days. One such story that I have recorded today involves an attorney who was at a caucus, and will be making a sworn affidavit to the effect that Obama voters were being told that the entire caucus site was for Hillary voters only at his location; that the Clinton supporters were manning the registration tables; that when he asked if an Obama volunteer could also sit at the registration table to assist in the process, they said no and told him to stop interfering or they would call the police. This story is exactly in line with other stories I have been told, including the interview you will read below.
I'm not a reporter, and I don't pretend to be, nor do I have time to track down all these people for interviews. It is my hope that interested parties out there who do get paid to do this for a living will take it up where I leave off and see where the trail leads. All of these people spoke on the record--but I am protecting their privacy at this time unless a legitimate reporter requests their info from me.
Unfortunately, these interviews were the only two that agreed to be recorded at the time (though I have several more recordings by phone at this point which have yet to be transcribed), and that I had the presence of mind to ask for an interview before it was too late. I am also calling on and looking into far more explosive charges that I cannot report responsibly without more legwork and verification.
I have links to the audio files of the two interviews for everyone to hear as well.
First, however, a little note on the relatively innocuous 11:30am/noon dispute that is sucking up all the oxygen on this issue. After further investigations, this seems to have been an innocent mistake on the part of the Clinton campaign: while the Nevada State Democratic Party 2008 Temporary Chair Caucus Guide handed out to all campaigns is unclear in some places, it states unequivocally on page 6: "In order to participate in the Nevada State Democratic Party Caucuses, attendees MUST be in line or signed in by noon. At noon Presidential Preference Cards should be given to any person in line..." Clinton's campaign materials instruct their volunteers that the doors should close at 11:30am. So while this issue seems to have been a misunderstanding, I would only note that it is curious that the Clinton campaign would err on the side of leaving voters out of the process, rather than allowing them in.
To begin, then, here is the text of an email I just received today from an Obama field organizer:
THANK YOU SO MUCH for getting the word out!! I was a border state volunteer in Mesquite, NV in Clark County (precincts 1515, 1516, 2465, 2466 and 2467). I witnessed all of this occur, as did the other four Obama volunteers at our caucus location.
Some specifics:
Attempted door closure at 11:15. Clinton supporters obviously had been told to arrive at 11:00.
Senile elderly voters being led in confused by Hillary operatives. Clinton stickers were slapped on their chests and they were sent to the Clinton corner to sit until the caucus was finished.
Obama supporters being misdirected tot he wrong location within the school. Mesquite is largely elderly retired folk, for whom walking from one end of the school to the other was quite a problem.
People being phoned and told the wrong caucus location.
Push polling reported in our precincts, as well as highlighted, printed out emails with the plege of allegiance, muslim rumors, etc. being mailed to local democrats.
Extremely racist remarks being made directly to an elderly, African American precinct captain by Hillary organizers.
Witnessed in my assigned precinct, 2466:
New Mexican voters caucusing. We know they're from New Mexico because we witnessed them tearing down our last Obama sign of the 60 we had placed in town, while driving a car w/NM plates.
The principal of the school we were at (Virgin Valley High), obviously a Clinton supporter, repeatedly making us take down our signs while doing nothing in regards to the dozens of Clinton signs that were up.
All caucus counting and math being done by Clinton supporters. The place was out of control, and the temp chair clearly hadn't recieved enough training to know what was supposed to happen.
My friend was working a caucus in North LV and reports Clinton operatives requiring birth certificates of Obama supporters in order to get in the door, as well as other intimidation tactics, and Clinton supporters flat out hijacking the caucus as basically everyone every where is reporting.
I don't know if you can do anything with this information or can direct me to somewhere else. Mike Jones, our regional coordinator, has reported everything following the protocol he was given. Please contact me if I can do anything to help bring this to light.
Thank you again,
xxxxxxxx
xxx-xxxx
My girlfriend just finished an audio interview with this person about 45 minutes ago--and there are more allegations beyond these as well which will have to wait until tomorrow for me to verify and transcribe.
Not enough? Following below is the first part of an interview with an Obama field organizer in charge of Precinct 3037. Interviewer quotes are in bold (my girlfriend KK conducted the interviews). This interview has been split into two sections, as secondhand accounts of the explosive allegations mentioned above have been deleted while I attempt to get firsthand accounts. Listen to the audio file at Heading Left:
And, you know, that really preludes a lot of what happened yesterday. There were a lot—230 I believe—separate incidents of voter misconduct and voter fraud across the state of Nevada.
As were reported to the Obama [phone] number, or to the State?
That was the number I heard yesterday from one of our people, who had been getting calls in from the hotline.
Another person: everyone on the hotline was directed to—it was hundreds of calls.
Yeah, I know. I called the hotline and it was busy. For like multiple calls. And I called two hours afterwards.
Another person: Yeah, we had eleven people answering all of our phones absolutely nonstop. And we, this was starting from 11:13 today getting inundated with calls. At 11:15 we started getting calls of "they’re shutting the doors", "they’re telling us they’re out of preference cards, they’re out of voter registration," and they were telling them to go away, that they couldn’t caucus and had to leave. And janitors physically locking doors. Hillary supporters physically blocking the doors so people couldn’t get in. Those were just some of the reports. There had to be hundreds. And like you said, it was busy, and every time we got one of those calls we got information, cell phone numbers, told them to tell their precinct captain to call the Democratic Party hotline. I was told that the hotline for the Democratic Party was also busy, that people couldn’t get in to tell them what was going on.
OK.
In the precincts I was at, I was at the Mountain Shadows Community Center, which is in Sun City. And I arrived there around 9:45 to find that the Hillary Clinton campaign had broken the rules by putting signs outside. So I talked to the temporary chair who was very uncooperative with me, a big Clinton supporter. And I finally went out there and agreed to take down the signs. And we put them, the signs on the sidewalk, so I thought that had been resolved. Later, the Hillary people started setting up tables in the front and putting up signs everywhere on the inside, again in violation of the caucus rules. At those tables, they were staffed by Hillary Clinton supporters. The sign-in table had a big Hillary banner before I got that taken down. I went outside to get some water for my people. When I came back, there were Hillary people, people had started coming in line, and Hillary people were doing the registration process [ed.: I would note that the same thing took place at my precinct and at countless others as well]. And I thought, you know, that’s a little funny. And I asked the temporary chair, you know, if we could get some Obama people up there. And he said, you know, no. These are State volunteers. We can’t do that.
Then I came to realize after hearing from some of my people that at least one of the Hillary Clinton people doing the sign in was checking off the Presidential preference box for Hillary Clinton before she ended up, before the vote. So they would go get their card and they’d be handed a card with a checked box for Hillary Clinton.
They were also being told that Precinct number 3037 was simply a Hillary Clinton precinct that Obama people weren’t allowed there. You know, I thought that was absolutely absurd, and I tried to get them to stop. I was told to go away by the Hillary people doing the sign in. I went outside and called the hotline, and was given the number for the Democratic Party. I talked to a Democratic lawyer—a lawyer from the party, and was trying to say that this is not a democratic process, this is not a democratic contest, this caucus, this is something that should be done in a 3rd world country. This isn’t America. Please stop the caucus. And he said that, you know, they couldn’t do it but they would look into it. So he told me to get on the phone with the temporary chair. Now, I couldn’t find the temporary chair at first, I looked around and the caucus hadn’t even started. So I went up to the microphone and I said, you know, "Is the temporary chair here? A lawyer from the Democratic Party wants to talk to you." Now, the temporary chair came, took the phone, proceeded to tell the lawyer that I was a complete lunatic and just making things up all over the place, and physically put my phone on the other side of the room so it was hard for me to get back to it and hung up before I could talk to the lawyer again. So I had to call him back and explain the situation to try to get the results frozen.
At that point, someone came up to me after I had been on the microphone—someone from the Party came up to me and told me to leave the premises. I said certai—or he would call the police. And I said, "sir, certainly I will leave the premises, but first allow me to get some statements from my supporters about what happened here." And he said, "No. You are going to leave the premises or I’m going to call the police." I then instructed one of my out-of-state volunteers who was helping out there to get statements from people. And we actually did get a signed statement from Gertrude Hawkins about what went on. We recovered a doctored ballot where they had checked it for Hillary Clinton. I proceeded to leave.
Yesterday [the day of the caucus] I got a further call from the Democratic Party saying that they had frozen the results in that caucus location. But later on in the day I called one of my captains saying that she had been elected a delegate to the convention from that location. Meaning that they unfroze the results. And if they unfroze the results, they unfroze the results without calling back and talking to me, and their investigation must have only consisted of talking to the State Democratic—talking to the temporary chair—and some of the authority figures who were Hillary people in that room. So that’s what happened to me at my location at Mountain Shadows.
And that was precinct number?
That was precinct 3037 was in that room. 3036, 3394, and um, there was one more in there I can look up for you.
Which one were you actually assigned to as a precinct chair?
I’m a field organizer, so I was kind of overseeing the whole thing there.
Here is a photo of a pre-marked voter card for Clinton (which the infuriated Obama voter crossed out and marked for Obama).
Here is a photo of a voter's signed statement that her voter card had been pre-marked for Clinton (not the same card, by the way):
Part two of this same interview follows:
So we’ve heard reports across the state about people at 11:30 being turned away from their locations even though the doors were supposed to be open until 12 o’clock. This happened in some poorer areas.
Also of Hillary Clinton people coming in through the back door and being a part of second counts.
Telling people in certain locations that they have to go home even when they were viable.
Refusing, my precinct location, refusing to register Obama people who wanted to switch parties, and first helping out people who wanted to register for Hillary. You know, there was a crowd of people over there. Some of my supporters ended up going home, you know, because they were not being helpful. You know, it’s just across the board.
The Hillary operatives in the caucus locations, the Hillary people had signs that were already pre-made put on the doors that said "doors close at 11:30". You know, and they didn’t. They were open until 12.
The Hillary Clinton campaign was also let in somehow to all the precinct locations somehow by the Party early. So they were there to set up the tables, to put up the signs.
What time were you supposed to be able to let, to go into the facilities?
Doors opened at eleven.
That was supposed to include people involved in the campaigns as well?
I believe so.
Who was that according to?
That was according to the rulebook. It didn’t say anything specific about letting campaign workers in, but the temporary caucus chairs were all told to be there at 10 o’clock, and so if the Hillary people were told to be there by nine, it was to get there before the caucus chairs.
When we talk about the book that has the rules for these things, that’s issued by the Nevada State Democratic Party, and these were all distributed to the same camps? Everybody got these books, right?
Yes.
Do you have a copy of the book I can take a look at?
Me: There’s a PDF. I have access to it.
[EDITOR'S NOTE: This appears to be a non-story. The document says to arrive "at least 1 hour early -- 10:00am", and then immediately call to report that the caucus location is open for business. At most, Hillary people and caucus chairs showing at 9am or earlier to set up might bespeak coordination, but nothing really untoward. I would note that the Obama camp had many of its volunteers foolishly hanging door signs at that time, rather than monitoring the caucus sites for irregularities.]
Also, another organizer, Ryan Adam, was a part of a precinct location where it was a primary. People came in early and submitted their ballots, their presidential preference cards, and by 11:30, the location was done, the caucus was done. Nobody else was let in.
Were there allegations that people who had left were being counted on those hand ballots?
Um, they weren’t on the premises. It was just people who—they had all left. They just came in, filled out their ballot and turned it in. And ryan called in the results at 11:30. And again, caucuses are supposed to be open until 12.
And is Ryan an Obama supporter and volunteer?
He’s a field organizer.
So they actually counted all the people and counted the votes at 11:30?
Yes
Got it.
Ryan called in his numbers at 11:30.
When did the first results come in?
You have to look at the records of the Democratic Party. He said he was calling in the results of the Democratic Primary. I said, you mean the caucus. And he said no, the primary. A primary happened here today.
Finally, what follows is an interview with another Obama volunteer, this time at the Las Vegas Library. The audio can be heard at Heading Left as well.
This was my first caucus, and I wasn’t prepared for what I encountered. I was driving the van around to pick up known Obama supporters who had indicated they needed a ride. So I was doing that, but because they were scattered through one of the worst—heh—I was driving through a neighborhood with a lot of graffiti and I drove through skid row. There were people camped in actual tents on the sidewalk. It was down off of Washington Boulevard. Washington and, um, Bronco? Buck? I can’t even remember now. By the library. At any rate, I had to pick up a man who had signed up to get a ride. He wasn’t there in his apartment. The neighbor said, oh, he went to the bar. And I said that’s ok, I can’t track him down at this point. While I was left there and I was in the van with the Obama Stand for Change, you know, taped to the sides, a lady flags me down in the street and asks where she was she supposed to caucus, and I said, "well, did they tell you? I don’t know. Are you from here?" And she says, "well yeah, I’m homeless but they told me I could caucus at the library." And I said, "oh, that’s where I’m going. That’s the caucus spot I have. I know where it is. Let’s go." And I picked her up off the street and she was walking to the caucus. And we talked—her name was Faye. And it was really interesting because she actually restored my [faith]. Um, I have not been involved in Presidential politics or any politics because I’ve been one of those cynical people who figure it’s not worth it. After today’s experience with the Hillary camp I still wonder. But when you meet a woman who’s willing to walk to the caucus because she’s homeless but she’s going to vote because she’s an American—to me, that’s, that’s America. You know, that’s—I wish everyone felt that strongly about voting because that’s, you know, so many people opt out of this process and then complain about the results. It makes me nuts.
I mean, ugh, I never realized politics was such an emotional sport. I mean, I have been—the highs are so high and the lows are so low and everything in between in the last two hours. I mean, my hands are still shaking from the adrenaline of the day. But when I dropped this lady off at the Las Vegas Library on Las Vegas Boulevard—one of the main ones across from Cushman—she ended up, I gave her a few posters to take into her caucus. This was a lady right off the street, I didn’t know her, she ended up being one of the people speaking up to help recruit in that caucus.
When I got to that caucus there was a security guard because I got there at about noon. And what happened was, um, a Hillary—she had a Hillary shirt on that said "Precinct Captain"—but she was not Nevadan, she said she was an operative because she said she was here from Iowa. She had caucused in Iowa and she was running the Hillary crew. The Hillary group has set up behind the podium. So they had taken over that space. So anyone who wanted to talk had to stand up in front of them, and they’re behind them heckling. And at 11:30, she shut the door and wasn’t going to let people in. The caucus chairman—the temporary caucus chairman who was appointed until they could elect one in the meeting, did not order it closed and had the security guard open it. And this woman was making so much trouble that the caucus chairman was asking what to do, and they were saying—the security guard who was in the lobby was saying, "Call the police." Three times she was this far from calling the police.
This was the, one of the other staffers?
I don’t know what she was, I mean she was wearing a Hillary precinct captain shirt. She was a Chicana lady. Um, I can’t remember her first name. Her last name was told to me as Sala or something like that. I don’t know if she was paid or not. I mean, all the people I know, well, I’m a volunteer. I’m just doing this because I’m passionate about change. And she was using every dirty trick, I was so—oh, it was so sad, because I—ha!—they told the Hillary people to go into the room, and they told the Obama people to stay in the lobby and sign the papers there and then she shut the door and said, "oh, if you’re not in the room you can’t come in."
Wow.
First off.
And what time was this?
Well, I got there at 12:05. And there were still people—I mean, I think it was right around 12 at that point, and the security guard was like, because there were people out there, and eventually they decided to—the people who were in line to sign in and to register to vote that day, um, he said at the end of this line, if you’re in line you get to go in and that’s where we’re going to cut it off.
Which is what I understand is what the rules were—that as long as you were in line before 12 filling out paperwork or in line, that that was ok.
The Hillary woman was saying, 11:30, it’s zip. The doors shut at 11:30 and she shut the doors. She says she didn’t physically shut the doors—we didn’t see who physically shut the doors, but it was not committee chair, caucus chair, and it was not the temporary caucus chair and it was not the woman who was later appointed by a commission to be the caucus chair. And later on, they said, "we did not say for the doors to close." And the Hillary person was like "at 11:30 the doors are supposed to close. I caucused in Iowa and I know what it says." And we’re like, it’s wrong. We have until noon.
So I had dropped off Faye and I saw a lot of people in the parking lot at the entrance to the library and I was like, I just had a sense that this is not good, you know, and so that’s why I went back to that location. When I pulled in there was two different people in the parking lot wandering around, asking if this was where they go to vote, and can they go here? And I said, "yes, you can go here." And he said, "but this is not my place. This is not my caucus spot." And I said, you know, "If you’re a legal resident and you’re eligible to caucus you can go in and fill out the provisional paperwork here. Let me show you where." I did not stop to ask him who they were voting for first. I didn’t care! We’re all Americans and we’re voting—whatever! I mean, that’s, to me, how Obama’s been operating: honorably. Honorably!
And so, it was, it was just, now I’m going to cry on the way home now that it’s kicking in, what I saw, this woman. And they had, we had 43 [laughter]—this is really interesting, it’s just sinking in. We had 43 people. The first alignment, the Clinton count was something like 43 or so, and Edwards only had 8, and Obama had I don’t remember the number, like 20 or something like that. And what’s interesting is, the woman, the Hillary person, there was a woman in there—I don’t know if she was a Hillary person or who she was—she had three sheets. She had three of those caucus sheets. She said, oh these are Hillary votes, but they left because there was—the woman was heckling people at the beginning and so people were afraid that violence was going to break out. Literally afraid and they left, and she said, "oh, they gave me their sheets and I’m turning them in."
Which those aren’t technically supposed to count at all. My understanding is you have to be present for the caucus.
Right. So she went from 43 to 46 or 49. And virtually there were 8—ok, the initial room count was 70, and it was, uh, something like 43 for Hillary, 8 for Edwards, 3 undecideds and the rest were Obama so if you do the math you’ll know. I didn’t do the math. [That would make 16 for Obama]. After the first alignment. And so then we started to talk. So I knelt down by two guys from the Edwards camp and there was a gentleman from Edwards there who was very nice. He was really cool. He was so calm about it all. He was really good. And I just said to you guys, you know, we respect Edwards a lot—I mean, I enjoy, he’s fun to watch when you watch the debates
He gives great debates. He’s very emotional, very passionate, very good speaker.
I enjoy him. I like listening to Obama too, but I really do--you can listen to Edwards all day [laughter] and I just knelt down kind of where these guys were sitting and asked "is there anything I can do to answer questions for you, would you like any information?" And I’m trying to talk to them and the volume in this room—this room could probably seat, well, so there were about 70 to 80 people in the room and it could probably seat maybe 150 people if it was set up in chairs. Now at this point the chairs were just scattered around the room in corners. And it was stifling in there [laughter]. What was I going to say? Um...[laughter] So I’m trying to talk to these gentlemen just calmly and I’m talking to the Edwards guy calmly and we’re discussing things and the Chicana woman, I mean, the head Hillary woman, the Hillary woman starts them chanting really loud. And I’m like, and I hear that happens, it’s like, we’re all trying to discuss this and they’re literally trying to drown us out and I’m thinking—and obviously they had been trained to do it—obviously that was their strategy, to be like that, and I’m thinking, and to be and to grab the podium space and it was all very strategized and I’m thinking, you see the strategizing and conniving that’s going into this one room, how they’re being trained to operate, and you’re supporting that by standing in that corner with them. How? I mean, I don’t get it. You know, I mean the Obama people, we were handing out water. We went around the room and handed out bottles of water. We didn’t only hand them out to the Obama people. I had people coming up to me confused about the caucus process, which it’s very confusing, and I was explaining it to them, and I didn’t stop to ask which corner they were in, and you know, so yeah, she’s trying to steal the election, you know? The people who object to Bush for the same thing and think that Bush is a change? Unh-uh. You know, and yeah, I won’t claim to be bipartisan or impartial at all, but you know, it’s been a real eye-opening experience, but a good one.
So those were my key experiences today. We’ll see what happens in California next.
That’s going to be an exciting one. So are you still staying involved in politics? Did it turn you off to have this type of experience?
No, it has not, but I’m going to have a cynical—I’m going to be down tonight, it’s all the deflation of the emotional highs of today, but I’ll tell you what. In the area I come from, I’m working with people who mobilized in my area, and we had a rally just word of mouth and we had 400 people show up, and these were people from the community. And so I met neighbors, I met a woman who lives on my street that I had never met before, and I’m talking black, white, yellow, green, every color, every persuasion, every religion, and we’re all talking to each other. And our community is united in a way it’s never been united before. So no matter what happens with Barack’s campaign, god forbid that he’s not on that ballot in November, I’ll be, America does not know what they’re passing up. I can’t even express how I feel that how can you not—I guess I’m a true believer—but how can you not look at everything he’s standing for in terms of intelligence, integrity and not vote for him? But you know, if nothing else, the grassroots campaign that he’s running has a model of community involvement and we’ve learned from his campaign how to organize our community. And we have learned skills that will allow us to do better things in our community. I mean, literally, a whole bunch of us Obama people are going to be walking in the local Martin Luther King walkathon to raise money on Monday on the 21st. You know, and it’s like, it’s not our party but we’re all neighbors and so, that has been the spirit behind this campaign, too. I mean, you know, we didn’t spend any time figuring out how to strategize to intimidate and grab the podium spot. We were out talking to people and offering them rides. And that’s the bottom truth of this campaign.
So, cynic? No. But sad, when you see something so good being run through that brutal process of politics, the meatgrinder. Here’s a man who is so intelligent and good willing to subject himself to the meatgrinder, and you know, it’s going to be more of the same or it’s going to be change. We’ll see.
I'll let these volunteers speak for themselves. I cannot and will not listen to these accounts, observe what I myself observed with my own two eyes, and sit on my hands. My conscience will not allow it. I apologize that I do not have more independent verification of these allegations--but once again, I'm not a reporter, I have no organization behind me, and I'm doing all I can with the time I have.
As I said, I am following up on the other even more explosive allegations and will report back hopefully tomorrow or Wednesday.
