Thankfully, we were able to hold onto the Governor's Mansion in Maryland handily, but Bob Ehrlich was up to his old tricks as usual on Tuesday.
So here is the brief story from WCBC Radio (out of Western MD):
Ehrlich Campaign Member Makes Robo-Calls
An official with Robodial.org said Friday that Rhonda Russell, a former director with Progressive Maryland made calls which told Democratic voters to "relax" and said that Gov. Martin O'Malley won the gubernatorial election. Mark Hampton, owner of Robodial.org, said Russell "used her credit card to make the purchase, recorded the call herself, uploaded the phone list to our system and ran the call." The calls, which came from a 202 area code, were made to thousands of voters Tuesday before the 8 p.m. closing of poll.
So I did a little more digging, as WCBC tends to have a (far) right slant in their news, and they aren't exactly known for doing much fact checking before running with a story.
So I found this on TPM, which pretty much confirms the story, but fleshes it out a bit.
Some of the more interesting points from TPM:
"The individual who initiated these calls had been working for Democrats in the past, she had an account with us for more than a year, and we assumed she still was," Robodial.org owner Mark Hampton told TPMMuckraker.
Voters in Maryland who received the phone call heard a recording of a woman who said she was "calling to let everyone know that Gov. O'Malley and President Obama have been successful. Our goals have been met. The polls were correct, and we took [inaudible]. We're okay. Relax. Everything is fine. The only thing left is to watch on TV tonight."
This isn't the first time that Ehrlich tried to use voter suppression tactics. In 2006 he tried to mislead minority voters into believing the election was on a Wednesday (obviously not directly through his campaign, but through an associate that was sending direct mailings). It doesn't surprise me that he would stoop this low as to try to convince people not to vote, even as the election is going on. What shocks me is the two individuals that actually were directly responsible for the calls.
With friends like Rhonda Russell and Julius Henson, who needs enemies? The fact that they took the access that they had to Democratic operations and used it to try to suppress votes, apparently just to make some cash, is beyond the pale. Hopefully, justice will be served and all parties involved with face jail time for the voter suppression crimes that they have committed.