State Winnows List of Suspect Voters to 2,500

Nearly 2,500 people on a congressional committee’s list of suspected noncitizens cast ballots in the district that Rep. Loretta Sanchez captured last November, California’s secretary of state reported to the committee Wednesday.

But Democrats and aides of Sanchez (D-Garden Grove) were quick to argue that the list is so riddled with errors that it is impossible to determine from available records whether the 2,474 voters are citizens or not. Also, they said, there is no way to determine whether the ballots were cast for Dornan or Sanchez.

Rep. Bill Thomas (R-Bakersfield), who chairs the House Oversight Committee investigating Sanchez’s 984-vote victory over former Rep. Robert K. Dornan, a Republican, refused to comment or explain the significance of the report prepared by Secretary of State Bill Jones.

That didn’t stop both sides from using the news to their advantage. Dornan embraced it as his long-awaited proof of widespread illegal voting, and a Sanchez aide denounced it as “a major setback” for Dornan that shows that 98% of the district’s 106,000 voters were beyond reproach.

Dornan claimed “vindication for a 13-month crusade” and said Sanchez should resign. He contended that if she did not, every Republican and possibly some Democrats would vote to vacate last year’s election result.

“I call for Mrs. Sanchez to do the decent thing, if she has any dignity left, and to resign,” he told a news conference at his lawyers’ offices in Santa Ana.

Jones “has now officially certified what we have contended for a year--Loretta Sanchez was elected by fraud and that at a minimum Bob Dornan is entitled to a new election,” said Dornan attorney Michael Schroeder, who is chairman of California’s Republican Party.

Sanchez aides and Democrats on the oversight panel downplayed the developments.

“Don’t let anybody suggest that this is an indication that there are 2,500 illegal votes here. It means nothing,” said Fred Woocher, one of Sanchez’s lawyers. “Let’s see some names, let’s see some information, let’s see some data.”

Sanchez chief of staff Steve Jost said Dornan’s call for the congresswoman’s resignation “is laughable.”

Connecticut Rep. Sam Gejdenson, the ranking Democrat on the oversight panel, called Jones’ finding “nothing more than the dog that didn’t bark.”

Jones made no determination on the citizenship status of the voters. The committee originally asked him to categorize a list of 4,761 names as voters, nonvoters, citizens, noncitizens and people whose status was unclear. But Jones said he could only verify who voted or was registered to do so.

“My highest priority . . . is the integrity of our elections,” Jones said in a news release issued Wednesday. “Should Congress have valid information that the individuals on this list are not eligible voters, I urge them to forward that information to me so I may appropriately remove the names from the active voter rolls.”

The secretary of state’s office said it received no information about the citizenship status of the 4,761 names sent by the oversight committee. “If you have questions about what the matches mean, you have to ask Congress,” said Jones’ spokeswoman, Beth Miller. “If Congress confirms it is a list of noncitizens, it means . . . people voted who are not citizens.”

The oversight committee has been investigating the election since Dornan contested the results a year ago. If the panel finds enough illegal ballots to throw the results into doubt, it can recommend to the full House that the seat be vacated and a special election called.

Thomas refused to say exactly what the list represents. Mark Braden, a lawyer working for the oversight committee, said he did not know which list was sent to Jones. Besides Jones’ analysis, Republican staffers are comparing signatures from voter registration and INS files to further scrutinize their prospective matches.

Sources close to the investigation who spoke on the condition of anonymity said the list was based on matches of names and dates of birth between the Orange County voter rolls and files from the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

Democrats said the matching process was flawed--some on the voter list have different first names or middle names, places of birth, or even a different gender than the corresponding INS file; many of the INS files came from outside California, raising questions about whether they relate to the Orange County vote.

Woocher and Jost noted that Jones eliminated 359 names from the list because of duplications. Jones also required only that those on the list share the voter registration affidavit number and name or date of birth with someone on the voter rolls to call it a match, and has himself said there is a 6% margin of error, they said.

“This is not the Match Game, it’s the Near Match Game,” Jost said in a statement. “The standard should be 100% confidence in a list of exact matches before the Congress considers disenfranchising a single American of their right to vote.”