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Latest Featured Reports | Saturday, October 5, 2024
Time Running Out For
All the Trump Rackets: 'BradCast' 10/3/24
'Pro-choice' Melania wants $250k from CNN; $100k 'Trump Watch' invites influence peddlers; Damning new 1/6 details; MAGA county clerk gets 9 years for CO vote system tampering...
'Green News Report' 10/3/24
  w/ Brad & Desi
After another climate disaster, climate change finally front and center at VP Debate; PLUS: Ongoing climate disaster Helene, now second deadliest hurricane in modern U.S. history...
Previous GNRs: 10/1/24 - 9/26/24 - Archives...
Vance Sane-Washes Trump, Self in Polite, Lie-Filled VP Debate with Walz:
'BradCast' 10/2/24
Special coverage with Heather Digby Parton of Salon, 'Driftglass' of 'Pro Left Podcast'...
How You Can Help Protect Democracy This Year: 'BradCast' 10/1/24
Guest: Emily Levy of Scrutineers.org; Also: Iran/Israel escalation; Dockworkers strike shuts down ports; Search, recovery -- and climate denier lies -- continue after Helene...
'Green News Report' 10/1/24
  w/ Brad & Desi
'GNR' Special Coverage: Climate change-fueled Hurricane Helene unleashes widespread death and destruction, as storm victims face daunting challenge of recovery...
Previous GNRs: 9/26/24 - 9/24/24 - Archives...
The Predictable Horrors of Helene: 'BradCast' 9/30/2024
Climate change strikes again, killing more than a hundred in 5 states, millions without power, concerns about their ability to vote; Also: Callers ring in before VP Debate...
Springfield Haitians Sue Trump, Vance, Musk et al over Defamation, Death Threats
Add'l defendants include Trump, Jr., OH A.G. Yost, OH U.S. Sen. candidate Moreno, LA Rep. Higgins...
Sunday 'Protection Racket' Toons
THIS WEEK: Creepers, Cowards and Conmen! (And they're all the same guy!)... In our latest collection of the week's creepiest toons...
Trump Weaponized Govt Against His Enemies, Vows to Do It Again: 'BradCast' 9/26/24
Also: NYC Mayor indicted; D.C. disbars Rudy; Newsmax settles with Smartmatic; Helene goes Cat 1 to 4 in single day before FL landfall...
'Green News Report' 9/26/24
  w/ Brad & Desi
Hurricane Helene guns for Florida; Global warming doubled odds of Europe's catastrophic flooding; PLUS: Biden promotes climate action at final U.N. address, with a warning...
Previous GNRs: 9/24/24 - 9/19/24 - Archives...
The Climate and Economy Stakes of 2024: 'BradCast' 9/25/24
Guest: Ryan Cooper of American Prospect; Also: Trump's Project 2025 in reality, in the U.S. House, and in song!...
Good News for Democracy in Nebraska, Arizona (Not Montana): 'BradCast' 9/24/24
Also: Hurricanes John and Helene; Biden's final address at the U.N. General Assembly...
'Green News Report' 9/24/24
CA sues ExxonMobil for plastic recycling lies; Cat 3 John strikes Mexico; Three Mile Island coming back to power Microsoft A.I.; PLUS: Climate Week kicks off in NYC...
No, GA's New Rule Does NOT Mandate Hand-Counted Results: 'BradCast' 9/23/24
Guest: Voting system expert Marilyn Marks on the wildly misreported Georgia news and what voters should be worried about instead...
Sunday 'Not Going Back' Toons
THIS WEEK: Springfield Follies ... Political Violence ... The Undecidables ... Pro-Life? ... And much more in our latest collection of the week's best toons!...
Losers' Stench: GOPers Gaming the Map to 270: 'BradCast' 9/19/24
Bad news for Rs in NC; Trump/Vance lies in OH; GOP Elector scheme in NE; Gaming GA result certification; Vote suppression in TX; Vote expansion in CA...
State A.G. and County Election Officials Square-Off Over Voter Registration in Texas
Right to register under assault following state's massive voter roll purge...
'Green News Report' 9/19/24
U.N. weather agency warns of climate chaos...that may already be here; NC storm tops $7B in damage; PLUS: Biden's air pollution policies will save 200,000 lives...
BARCODED BALLOTS AND BALLOT MARKING DEVICES
BMDs pose a new threat to democracy in all 50 states...
VIDEO: 'Rise of the Tea Bags'
Brad interviews American patriots...
'Democracy's Gold Standard'
Hand-marked, hand-counted ballots...
Brad's Upcoming Appearances
(All times listed as PACIFIC TIME unless noted)
Media Appearance Archives...
'Special Coverage' Archives
GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal 2012...
VA GOP VOTER REG FRAUDSTER OFF HOOK
Felony charges dropped against VA Republican caught trashing voter registrations before last year's election. Did GOP AG, Prosecutor conflicts of interest play role?...

Criminal GOP Voter Registration Fraud Probe Expanding in VA
State investigators widening criminal probe of man arrested destroying registration forms, said now looking at violations of law by Nathan Sproul's RNC-hired firm...

DOJ PROBE SOUGHT AFTER VA ARREST
Arrest of RNC/Sproul man caught destroying registration forms brings official calls for wider criminal probe from compromised VA AG Cuccinelli and U.S. AG Holder...

Arrest in VA: GOP Voter Reg Scandal Widens
'RNC official' charged on 13 counts, for allegely trashing voter registration forms in a dumpster, worked for Romney consultant, 'fired' GOP operative Nathan Sproul...

ALL TOGETHER: ROVE, SPROUL, KOCHS, RNC
His Super-PAC, his voter registration (fraud) firm & their 'Americans for Prosperity' are all based out of same top RNC legal office in Virginia...

LATimes: RNC's 'Fired' Sproul Working for Repubs in 'as Many as 30 States'
So much for the RNC's 'zero tolerance' policy, as discredited Republican registration fraud operative still hiring for dozens of GOP 'Get Out The Vote' campaigns...

'Fired' Sproul Group 'Cloned', Still Working for Republicans in At Least 10 States
The other companies of Romney's GOP operative Nathan Sproul, at center of Voter Registration Fraud Scandal, still at it; Congressional Dems seek answers...

FINALLY: FOX ON GOP REG FRAUD SCANDAL
The belated and begrudging coverage by Fox' Eric Shawn includes two different video reports featuring an interview with The BRAD BLOG's Brad Friedman...

COLORADO FOLLOWS FLORIDA WITH GOP CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION
Repub Sec. of State Gessler ignores expanding GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal, rants about evidence-free 'Dem Voter Fraud' at Tea Party event...

CRIMINAL PROBE LAUNCHED INTO GOP VOTER REGISTRATION FRAUD SCANDAL IN FL
FL Dept. of Law Enforcement confirms 'enough evidence to warrant full-blown investigation'; Election officials told fraudulent forms 'may become evidence in court'...

Brad Breaks PA Photo ID & GOP Registration Fraud Scandal News on Hartmann TV
Another visit on Thom Hartmann's Big Picture with new news on several developing Election Integrity stories...

CAUGHT ON TAPE: COORDINATED NATIONWIDE GOP VOTER REG SCAM
The GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal reveals insidious nationwide registration scheme to keep Obama supporters from even registering to vote...

CRIMINAL ELECTION FRAUD COMPLAINT FILED AGAINST GOP 'FRAUD' FIRM
Scandal spreads to 11 FL counties, other states; RNC, Romney try to contain damage, split from GOP operative...

RICK SCOTT GETS ROLLED IN GOP REGISTRATION FRAUD SCANDAL
Rep. Ted Deutch (D-FL) sends blistering letter to Gov. Rick Scott (R) demanding bi-partisan reg fraud probe in FL; Slams 'shocking and hypocritical' silence, lack of action...

VIDEO: Brad Breaks GOP Reg Fraud Scandal on Hartmann TV
Breaking coverage as the RNC fires their Romney-tied voter registration firm, Strategic Allied Consulting...

RNC FIRES NATIONAL VOTER REGISTRATION FIRM FOR FRAUD
After FL & NC GOP fire Romney-tied group, RNC does same; Dead people found reg'd as new voters; RNC paid firm over $3m over 2 months in 5 battleground states...

EXCLUSIVE: Intvw w/ FL Official Who First Discovered GOP Reg Fraud
After fraudulent registration forms from Romney-tied GOP firm found in Palm Beach, Election Supe says state's 'fraud'-obsessed top election official failed to return call...

GOP REGISTRATION FRAUD FOUND IN FL
State GOP fires Romney-tied registration firm after fraudulent forms found in Palm Beach; Firm hired 'at request of RNC' in FL, NC, VA, NV & CO...
The Secret Koch Brothers Tapes...

Univ. of Missouri's Jeffrey Milyo Can't Recall Name of Thor's ACVR-Funded Group That Funded His Photo ID/Indiana Study
'An organization called the Center for Ethics Research, or Something Like That,' Says Academic When Asked Who Gave Him Grant Money...
By Howard Beale on 3/13/2008 1:05pm PT  

Guest Blogged by Howard Beale of Fired Up! Missouri...

Thor Hearne and his phony White House/GOP "American Center for Voting Rights" (ACVR) front group may be officially disbanded, but that simply means their still mysteriously-funded, tax-exempt scam to push for disenfranchising Photo ID restrictions at polling places around the country continues beneath the radar and by occasionally different names. Same anti-democracy thugs. Same money. A few less discredited (so far) names.

One of those names was front and center yesterday during a hearing on Capitol Hill yesterday, as the huckster Hearne could be heard faintly in the distance, still pulling the strings.

When the U.S. Senate's Committee on Rules and Administration held a hearing yesterday to discuss whether Photo ID Voting Laws lead to disenfranchisement, University of Missouri academic Jeffrey Milyo was among those who were present to give testimony.

The primary reason for Milyo's inclusion in the panel was his recent publication of a study purporting to show that restrictive photo ID voting laws had no adverse effect on voter turnout in 2006 elections in Indiana. Never mind that voter turnout is not necessarily indicative of whether or not voters were disenfranchised by such laws or not. More to the point, for the moment, while Milyo's testimony poured forth easily for the committee when he was talking about his contention that Photo ID laws do not disenfranchise voters, he became less erudite when the simple question arose of how his research had been funded.

There was good reason for his sudden hemming and hawing...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---

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The Discredited ACVR's Disgraced GOP 'Voter Fraud' Fraudster Reviving His Once-Popular Huckster Routine...
By Howard Beale on 12/17/2007 11:50am PT  

Guest Blogged by Howard Beale of Fired Up! Missouri...

In an irony of ironies, the man famous for fabricating --and then suddenly disappearing-- an organization expressly for purposes of spreading misinformation about "voter fraud" in order to suppress Democratic vote counts, is now hitting classrooms to teach Missouri lawyers about campaign finance laws and lobbyist disclosure.

Thor Hearne is apparently set to headline an event next week sponsored by the Missouri Bar which is titled "Then and Now: Update on Campaign Finance and Lobbying Laws."

Perhaps Hearne will lovingly detail all the steps that one can take --hypothetically, of course-- to concoct front organizations that serve as proxies for partisan interests and then lobby legislatures for needless statutory changes that will strip away rights from legal voters and provide their party with structural electoral advantages.

This appearance by Hearne seems to be the latest in a series of contrived efforts to re-enter the public sphere after several months in hiding. Hearne largely disappeared from the scene after he became a touchstone of the actions of a corrupt and politically motivated Department of Justice --- who brought "voter fraud" prosecutions timed to coincide with elections, in violation of written DoJ procedures, etc. --- and suffered well-deserved beatings at the hands of Congressional investigators.

Hearne has recently surfaced, comically, as an election "expert" in a silly piece from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch's Jo Mannies and as the author of an amicus curiae brief on behalf of 41 Congressional supporters, including Missouri GOP nuts Sen. Kit Bond and Rep. Roy Blunt, of Indiana's anti-voter voter identification law which is currently before the U.S. Supreme Court. Presumably, Hearne believes that people have somehow forgotten that he was proven to be a charlatan and laughingstock just a few months ago. Neither FiredUp! Missouri nor The BRAD BLOG has forgotten.

The one saving grace of the Missouri Bar's seminar may be that Hearne's anti-rights ranting will be balanced out by one of his co-presenters, attorney Rob Heggie, who possesses a long record of standing up in favor of protecting the rights of Missouri voters.

For more information on the "non-partisan" tax-exempt ACVR "Voter Fraud" scam and the snakeoil salesmen who invented it, Bush/Cheney '04 National General Counsel Mark F. "Thor" Hearne and RNC Communications Director Jim Dyke, please see BRAD BLOG's full Special Coverage of the "American Center for Voting Rights" at https://BradBlog.com/ACVR.
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Group Was Run by Another Shady Character Involved in Missouri Fee Office Scandal, Connected to Jack Abramoff Groups...
By Howard Beale on 6/15/2007 1:20pm PT  

Guest Blogged by Howard Beale of Fired Up! Missouri

On Wednesday The BRAD BLOG pointed out just one of the reasons he may be trying, as much as he is, to make his American Center for Voting Rights (ACVR) past disappear. It seems the group lied about their activities on their federal 990 public tax disclosure forms. But here comes another reason he may be hoping to hide his sordid past.

More so than ever before, the interconnected nature of the national and Missouri-based efforts to advance specious "voter fraud" claims and bend the operation of government entities to specific partisan political advantage is becoming clear. And the centrality of Mark F. "Thor" Hearne II to all of those efforts has never been more obvious than it is after the aggregation of a number of key facts.

State corporate and federal tax filings indicate that Thor Hearne --the undisputed mastermind and ringleader of the now-defunct and "disappeared" ACVR --- was responsible for the creation of a Missouri-based front group that issued public "reports" about topics like voter registration fraud which echoed messages being pushed at the national level by prominent GOP officials and ACVR itself. The Missouri organization, the Center for Ethics and the Free Market, was partially funded with one of the only (if not the only) monetary grants awarded by the ACVR and had its bookkeeping and non-profit filings done by Garrett Lott, a key figure in the Missouri fee office management company scheme overseen by Show-Me State Governor Matt Blunt and run out of Hearne's powerful Missouri law firm, Lathrop & Gage.

­While the ACVR was likely not even a gleam in his eye, back in February 2003, Thor Hearne filed paperwork with Missouri's Secretary of State to create a non-profit corporation called Center for Research of Ethics in Public Policy and the Free Market. Those records indicate that Hearne --addressed at the St. Louis office of his Lathrop & Gage law firm --- is the registered agent for the outfit. That organization, either for purposes of brevity or for throwing researchers off the trail, uses a slightly modified version of that name --- the Center for Ethics and the Free Market-- for its operations.

Among the work done by the Center for Ethics and the Free Market is "research" that tracks very closely with the "voter fraud" and "voter registration fraud" fearmongering that had been undertaken nationally by the American Center for Voting Rights. In June 2004, just months in advance of a presidential-year general election, the Center for Ethics and the Free Market issued a report that purportedly pointed to "concerns" with Missouri voter registration efforts [PDF] undertaken by progressive groups like America Coming Together and Missouri Progressive Vote Coalition. That report included language intended to inflate the potential for "voter fraud" --- language that has become familiar via various national voter suppression efforts...

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Once Again Removes References to GOP Gaming of 2000 Voter Rolls, Discredited GOP Claims of Democratic Fraud...
By Howard Beale on 6/5/2007 10:11am PT  

Guest Blogged by Howard Beale of Fired Up! Missouri

The Kansas City Star just can't help itself. When it comes to high-level reporting on the issue of the national GOP's attempts to politicize justice and steal elections with its phony "voter fraud" project, it seems there's no story that the Star's editors can't make mushier and more GOP-friendly.

Today the Star again does with a piece by Greg Gordon of news syndicate McClatchy what it did to a Gordon story from some weeks ago, refusing to print some of the most important facts underlying the lack of factual basis for GOP allegations of voter fraud.

Most notable in the Kansas City Star version of today's Greg Gordon piece for McClatchy is the treatment of the disposition of the Department of Justice lawsuit against the state of Missouri regarding voter rolls. Of the suit, Gordon writes (emphasis added):

In late 2005, the department sued Missouri's Democratic secretary of state, Robin Carnahan, charging that her state had failed to eliminate ineligible voters from registration rolls. A federal judge threw out the suit this spring, noting that the registration lists were controlled by county registrars over whom Carnahan had little authority and the Justice Department had presented no evidence of fraud.

The KCStar's rewrite of that graf rips out its substantive guts. The McClatchy-owned Star goes with this GOP-friendlier construction instead...

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