It was one of the few — if not the only — coordinated efforts to attempt in-person voter fraud, and it was pulled off by affiliates of conservative activist James O’Keefe at polling places in New Hampshire Tuesday night. All of it part of an attempt to prove the need for voter ID laws that voting rights experts say have a unfair impact on minority voters.
Now election law experts tell TPM that O’Keefe’s allies could face criminal charges on both the federal and state level for procuring ballots under false names, and that his undercover sting doesn’t demonstrate a need for voter ID laws at all.
Federal law bans not only the casting of, but the “procurement” of ballots “that are known by the person to be materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent under the laws of the State in which the election is held.”
Hamline University law professor David Schultz told TPM that there’s “no doubt” that O’Keefe’s accomplices violated the law.
These guys are so god damned stupid we’re getting to the point they will be featured on one of those cable shows featuring America’s dumbest criminals. “Hey guys, let’s go break multiple laws, film it, and then show everyone. I see no flaws with this plan!”
Spaghetti Lee
Ah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah. What a moron. He’ll probably find some way to slither out of it, though.
gnomedad
Bank robbery is a big problem. It’s time someone did an exposé.
BGinCHI
That pic is how O’Keefe looks after I’m through with him after our Texas Cage Match.
I’m an English Professor, but I’m fierce.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Hmm, O Keffe used is “young and dumb” card with that attempt to wire tap that Senator’s office. It seems dubious a judge will be so forgiving a second time around, even when invoking 1% privilege. After all, he is setting a poor example for the little people.
Calouste
Proper Tea Partier, that O’Keefe, bit fat typo on the video.
cathyx
Putting duct tape on your hair, now that’s stupid.
joes527
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: He isn’t as young as he used to be, but it is pretty clearly demonstrated that he is dumb as he used to be … so he has that going for him.
gaz
I said this in another thread – but again, isn’t he already on Probation? O’Keefe is screwed!
Violet
What an idiot. I hope they throw the book at him. Plus, O’Keefe now has a history of lawbreaking. Career criminal?
Egg Berry
Isn’t O’Keefe still on probation?
gaz
@Egg Berry: jinx…
heh
dmsilev
Remember that episode with the CNN reporter who O’Keefe tried to invite onto his sex-lair boat? Compared to that, this is almost a childish lark.
Benjamin Franklin
When O’Keefe couldn’t find voter fraud, it became necessary to invent it.
Jennifer
Rapeboat captain O’Keefe also pretty much failed to demonstrate that there’s even much opportunity for people to vote by fraudulently claiming the identity of a dead person. Almost all of the dead voters his moron minions impersonated had been deceased for under 2 weeks. So he failed to even show that government was inefficient in purging the rolls of the dead.
Apparently dumbass and company believe that simply by proving that it’s possible to cast a vote fraudulently that it proves such practices are a widespread problem. That’s kind of hard to do when the only “point” you manage to score is “I got someone to believe I was a guy who died 10 days ago!”
gaz
Hate to be a buzzkill, but you know what sucks about all of this?
It’s not gonna bring ACORN back.
And that’s the bigger crime, IMO
amk
I’ll believe in ‘law’ when this fucker sees some jail time. Until then, meh.
Mattminus
I’m sure he doesn’t have the courage to actually go through with anything. My bet is he seduces young republican closet cases into doing his dirty work for him now.
kdaug
Duct tape ninja.
Got my Halloween costume.
Calouste
@Egg Berry:
O’Keefe’s on probation until mid 2013 according to someone on the GOS. So he better pack some clean underwear and buy a one way ticket to Lousiana.
Litlebritdifrnt
At some point he is going to hit habitual felon status and then the “three strikes you’re out” law hits in. Dweeb will be going away for a long long time then.
HA! OT Chris Matthews showing a clip of Meryl Streep saying that she did some research on Maggie Thatcher for her role in the movie and discovered that she believed the NHS was a right and that she was pro-choice, and “she would have been drummed out of the modern day Republican party”
GregB
This little ratfucker better suffer some penalty for coming to my state and trying to use recently dead citizens for his shitheel games.
dubo
Videotaping this crime spree is the best idea we ever had!
— Jimbo Jones
Sad Iron
Hey, as long as they rolled in dressed like OG New Hampshire pimps, then it’s all good.
Jennifer
@Jennifer: Just to add: the best outcome for this is would be for them to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. I’m sure their argument will be that it was a journalistic exercise to prove that it was possible to cast a fraudulent vote. Well, yeah. That’s why the law establishes penalties for those who try to do it. The final takeaway from this will thus hopefully prove the opposite of what O’Keefe was trying to illustrate. It’s also possible to murder people, which is why we have laws against that as well, and there’s no reason why this offense should be given any more a pass than if someone’s excuse was that they killed someone else to prove it could be done.
gaz
BTW Cole, I see what you did there.
Took me a bit, admittedly.
Trying to give tbogg some competition? (see “We’re not worthy…” from the other day)
jl
In some plausible world, I guess a few people getting together to hatch a criminal conspiracy, and the whole crew getting busted when one of them gets nabbed red handed on a first try shows an obvious need for draconian new voter
suppressionID laws.Not sure what world that would be But no worries, I can just wait to hear how Fox News does it.
Anne Laurie
Bet you a store-bought cookie O’Keefe claims that arresting him is an Obama-led ASSAULT on his FREEDOM OF SPEECH rights, because wolverines! ! !
And either Bill Kristol or Charles Krauthammer have already finished columns explaining that both sides…
Jay in Oregon
@Sad Iron:
The funny thing about that story is that they didn’t actually go in dressed like pimps. They shot that footage afterwards and edited it in.
http://washingtonindependent.com/77096/hannah-giles-explains-those-pimp-and-prostitute-outfits
Not that it makes a lick of difference in the outcome, but you’d think that media outlets would think twice about using stories and footage from an admitted liar and fabricator.
(…OK, I couldn’t keep a straight face either when saying that.)
Comrade Javamanphil
O’Keefe would have gotten away with it too…if he was black!
Jay in Oregon
@Jennifer:
I like that title much better than “serial liar and fabricator.” Swiped!
quannlace
Who or what, in god’s name is that photograph of?
**********
Maybe, near election day, O’Keefe can carve a backward ‘B’ on his cheek. Or convince one of his deluded minions to do it on themselves.
schlmizel
I’m willing to bet they skate. Again. Seems they have friends in high places
AA+ Bonds
Im sure they ginned themselves up by reflecting on how very much like MLK Jr. they would all be if they went to jail over this :|
Zifnab
It’s only stupid when you actually end up in jail.
Hungry Joe
It’s just a matter of time until somebody puts a hand on O’Keefe’s forehead, gives him a hammer, and says, “Try to hit my hand.” I’ll do it myself if I ever run into him.
WereBear (itouch)
He keeps trying to rekindle that first blaze of glory. I’m sure now he doesn’t realize that as useful as he was; he’s expendable now. But was he involved in this in a prosecutable way? I didn’t see in the article that he was.
geg6
Jeez, Cole. The least you could do is give me a h/t since I linked to this about three threads ago. ;-)
That said, as I mentioned earlier, this story made my day. Hopefully, this finally puts this skeevy fucker in prison where he belongs. What a cesspool the College Republicans must be. Sociopaths and psychpaths, every single one of them.
noodler
Is there an outtakes or bloopers reel?
MikeBoyScout
Not that anything will be done, but some of you were wondering, and apparently the google machine is broken.
James O’Keefe and friends plead guilty in Mary Landrieu office caper
Omnes Omnibus
@WereBear (itouch): Conspiracy, for starters.
gaz
@quannlace:
_____________________________________________________________
1st half – if I recall this mug correctly, he was one of the duct-tape bandits – some guys robbed a store – or a bank – or something and wrapped duct-tape on their heads as a disguise, (possibly topping the idiots who tried to disquise themselves with magic marker, in sheer stupidity.)
I haven’t googled this to verify, it’s just off the top of my head. Still – plenty of keywords to farm – I bet I saw it on DailyRotten.com – if that helps.
2nd half: Dude! That’s messed up! I remember that story. LOL.
*thumbs up*
Edit: FYWP blockquote!
MikeBoyScout
If only the White House Plumbers had video recorded their break-in, Zombie Nixon could have won the GOP nomination in 2012.
WereBear (itouch)
@Omnes Omnibus: Sounds promising! I find him loathesome and apparently the only way to make him stop is to lock him up.
WaterGirl
How offensive is it to people who just lost a loved one that some creep thinks “hey, somebody just died, that will be awesome for my next stunt”. Pathological creep. I hope they throw the book at him.
moops
I’m guessing Captain Rapeboat is aware he will serve jail time for his crime. A few months at most. He thinks he will still get to live a decent living off grifting and wingnut welfare even with a criminal conviction on his record. It will make him more of a celebrity.
His loser accomplices will just get a criminal record.
Cacti
Isn’t O’Keefe already on 3 years probation for his phone tampering in Mary Landrieu’s office?
Hmmm…conspiracy to commit voter fraud sounds like it might be a violation of that.
gaz
@geg6:
I saw that too. I thought about bringing it up, but didn’t want to step on your toes.
When I’m being especially charitable, I like to think that any perceived “stingyness” of hat tips (which I’ve noticed before) is not so much a product of malice, as it is a factor of the sheer effort required. BJ FP’ers would be h/t’ing a commenter from a previous thread on every story. Maybe several commenters =) =P
Maybe it’s not laziness. Maybe the one thing I like the most about Balloon Juice is the level of audience participation.
Or maybe I’m being too charitable and JC is just a closet asshole, sans closet. ;). */shrug/*
heheh.
srv
O’Keefe is going to get away with this, just like he did the last two times.
Holder and crew will roll over when Fox starts predicting the DoJ may persecute wingnuts in search of the truth. Senators and Congressmen will rally.
Nellcote
I’m very very disappointed that isn’t actually a photo of O’Keefe.
Peter
Hey, this scares the hell out of me! All anyone had to do was to find 41,000 registered voters who had died recently, and another 41,000 people to risk a felony conviction, and . . . Ron Paul would have beaten Mitt Romney!!
You know, maybe we should encourage our wingnuts to pull stunts like this — the prosecutions will remove the stupidest sector of the population from circulation for a while.
Oh, by the way, the Statistical Abstract reports that there were 10,000 deaths in New Hampshire in 2008.
Chris Wolf
A dKos fp likened it to attempting to prove that you can rob a bank with a plastic gun.
gaz
@noodler:
Doesn’t the very nature of the video make such a thing redundant?
Benjamin Franklin
@gaz:
You don’t know that…for sure. :)
Cacti
Well, I looked up ye olde Federal Sentencing Guidelines, and if Herr O’Keefe is convicted of a federal, state, or local offense punishable by a term of imprisonment exceeding 1 year…
His previous term of probation is summarily revoked and he does mandatory time.
pseudonymous in nc
O’Queef is so dumb, he doesn’t know the way to manipulate elections without getting caught: voter suppression. A few dozen flyers, some untraceable robocalls, Voter ID laws that require non-driving seniors to travel 20 miles to the nearest DMV…
amk
@Cacti: I sure hope so.
burnspbesq
@Omnes Omnibus:
Don’t forget wire fraud. I’m sure there were emails flying around in furtherance of the conspiracy.
And one of these clowns will lie to the FBI or the grand jury, so keep 1001 and obstruction in mind. And then they’ll move on to destroying evidence and tampering with witnesses.
It’s the Process Crimes Jackpot! You win up to 25 years!
burnspbesq
@Cacti:
Can he get an enhancement for being a dick?
JWL
State and federal authorities will have to indict. Though a deal will probably be worked out that avoids a trial, those clowns are as good as in the system already. They would have fit right in with John Brown’s crew at Harpers Ferry.
JoyceH
“I was breaking the law to prove the law could be broken” – geez, why didn’t Al Capone think of this brilliant defense?
Michael
@burnspbesq: God I hope so
WereBear (itouch)
@JoyceH: And it’s so versatile.
Omnes Omnibus
@burnspbesq: Yeah, that too.
dead existentialist
From the TPM link in John’s post:
Has anybody seen our little friend today?
trollhattan
If it’s his
lackeys“affiliates” what done the deeds how are they going to nail O’Keefe?I’m guessing the conversation went something like this.
“Dudes, I’d so go with you but they know what I look like and I’d mess up the operation.”
“Jimmy, just take off the pimp outfit, dude!”
Palli
@gaz: yes
Jeffraham Prestonian
If that photo is from what I think it’s from, that happened in my hometown. Shamrock Liquors robber, a/k/a “The duct-tape bandit.”
.
Cacti
@trollhattan:
Conspiracy.
Jeffraham Prestonian
Yep.
Sorry, Fox News link, but that’s my old hometown. Haven’t been there in ages.
.
Palli
@noodler: yes there is an unavailable out take the O’Keefe kids have- a video of the poll watcher who recognized one of the O’Keefe boys was not the old man he claimed to be. The boy ran away immediately before he could be detained.
EvolutionaryDesign
@dead existentialist: I was thinking the same thing earlier today when I read this article. It would make all kinds of sense, wouldn’t it?
Omnes Omnibus
@trollhattan:
He organized, filmed, and edited it, right? Also too, wanna bet someone rolls fast?
Palli
@JWL:
Please don’t compare these punks with the twenty-one brave men at Harpers Ferry. They were not in the least delusional about self sacrifice. O’Keefe and his gang are self-important, cowardly, grandstanding cartoons who think they are gifted political operators making history. There is no authentic passion in what they do.
DanielX
I really hate to wish ill on anybody, but….what am I saying? I hope the smarmy little shit ends up getting convicted and put someplace where he can get some real life experience with Santorum. Preferably at the hands and other parts of someone weighing at least 300 pounds.
stevestory
edit: mibad
Snarki, child of Loki
*That someone having lots of scary tatoos and current Arian Nations and GOP memberships.
In other words, Chris Christie.
moops
just leave behind the prison rape jokes. ugh.
DanielX
@moops: Okay, deal. How ’bout he has to spend all eternity locked in a room with Ann Coulter.
gaz
@DanielX:
I’m not entirely sure that whatever passes for lube in prison would make the resulting mixture (solution?) qualify as santorum.
Then again, I don’t really want to know. I just wanted to drop a bomb y’all couldn’t unread. =)
Edit: Prison rape is fucked up wrong and gross. So there’s that. Also. Too.
gaz
Call me nuts, but I just want my ACORN back. =/
I honestly don’t care what happens to O’Keefe at this point, as long as people stop believing his lies.
Triassic Sands
Is it mean to hope that O’Keefe does hard time?
Even if it is, I hope the worthless POS is prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, is convicted, and gets real jail time. Richly deserved.
Anne Laurie
@Triassic Sands:
I’d settle for enough exposure that the Media courtiers decide he’s too “toxic” for them to keep pimping. Ha ha ha ha (/bitter).
Death Panel Truck
But “World’s Dumbest Criminals” features Tonya Harding and Danny Partridge! They’re not stupid! Tonya ordered her minions to kneecap Nancy Kerrigan. It’s not her fault they fucked it up! And Danny got his nads kicked in by a transvestite hooker. How was he to know s/he was better hung than he was?
Oh, and Cole? “Goddamned” is one word. One. Fucking. Word.
Triassic Sands
@Anne Laurie:
That would be great, but it’s unbelievably difficult to permanently discredit scumbags in the US. When someone like Don Imus says horribly racist and/or offensive things on the air (repeatedly over a period of years), a temporary shaming is followed by a triumphant return, often with a pay raise.
Will Pat Buchanan’s current problems be permanent? I wouldn’t bet a dime on that. Still, hope springs eternal.
SFAW
Maybe it’s splitting hairs, but I think there may be authentic passion.
Unfortunately, it’s the passion of an infantile, angry, not-very-bright, entitled, self-important, evil piece of shit who has delusions of being a crusader against Teh Evul Lieberals.
But I agree re: comparing him/them to John Brown et al. If O’Queefe were ever in any danger of paying the price John Brown did, he’d shit his pants in a femtosecond. Asshole.
Zach
This is predictable behavior from O’Keefe, but it’s incredible that The Daily Caller and Tucker Carlson are pushing it so hard when it’s clearly video of a felony. The Daily Caller’s hosted other O’Keefe videos, right? An aggressive US Attorney in New Hampshire could likely go after the folks in the video on Federal voter impersonation charges and get O’Keefe AND the Daily Caller with RICO.
El Cid
So the idea was to prove that a criminal conspiracy to use stolen identities to vote is bad and could possibly allow one or more of the persons using a stolen identity to succeed in voting, maybe?
When has this ever not been true?
DanielX
@gaz: True, and you’re right. On the other hand, I bet that if O’Keefe had to make the choice between that and being locked up in a room for all eternity with Ann Coulter, he’d have to think hard about the choice.
gaz
@DanielX: For all I know, the guy masturbates to Coulter.
Moonbatman
At least the ATF/DOJ denied in a letter that they allowed gunwalking in Fast and Furious.
It still proves to us progressives/Democrats that the US needs more Gun Control laws.