Justice Department to Send Election Observers to Arizona as Concern Rises About Illegal Voters

The Justice Department is sending a small pack of election observers to Arizona as Hispanic groups sound the alarm over an anti-illegal immigration group's mass e-mail seeking to recruit Election Day volunteers to help block illegal immigrants from voting.

Hispanic voting rights groups say the e-mail is just an attempt to intimidate minority voters. But election fraud monitors say that there are hundreds of examples of duplicate registrations, wrong information and past unregistered voters getting ballots.

Voter fraud allegations have emerged just days before the midterm in many crucial battleground states across the country, including Nevada, Pennsylvania and Florida.

The Justice Department announced Friday it would deploy more than 400 federal observers to 30 jurisdictions in 18 states ahead of Tuesday's election. But Arizona officials say the department had already committed to sending observers to their state.

Justice Department officials had notified Maricopa County that they would send a "handful" of election observers, even before the e-mail was sent, Matthew Benson, a spokesman for Arizona's secretary of state, told FoxNews.com. 

"We don't know why (the observers are) coming," he said. "But we do not believe it's in response to the e-mails making the rounds."

But William Gheen, executive director of Americans for Legal Immigration, said he knows why they're coming.

"They're sending them out because the Obama administration is doing everything it can to make sure as many illegal aliens vote in 2010 although that is a violation of federal law," he told FoxNews.com.

Benson noted that the Justice Department sends election observers to at least one Arizona county every election. In 2006, the department sent around 30 election observers to Maricopa County, he said.

Benson said the plan had nothing to do with the firestorm elicited by Ban Amnesty Now, or B.A.N., the group that sent an e-mail entitled "6 Days to STOP Illegals from Stealing the Election!"

The e-mail said "open-border criminals" in the unions, the White House and Hispanic groups are "determined to undermine" the election.

The e-mail originally included the signature of Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, an immigration enforcement proponent and B.A.N. honorary co-chairman, but Arpaio's name was later removed after Sean McCaffrey, the president of B.A.N., said he didn't mean to send out the e-mail attributed to the sheriff.

That didn't deter one voting rights group, Mi Familia Vota, from sending a letter to Justice Department officials Thursday asking them to send election observers.

"We are very concerned when you have Sheriff Joe Arpaio putting out this type of call to the community with the fear and concern that illegals are going to take over the election," said Ben Monterroso, president of the group. "It's not that we're not concerned that the elections are secure, but the way that it's been written – anyone who has the appearance of a foreign person, i.e. being a Latino – then that can create intimidation and violate their rights to vote."

McCaffrey said Friday that, despite the erroneous attribution to Arpaio, he is looking for volunteers to provide information to his group about voter fraud, "especially stories concerning activities involving illegal aliens."

"We hope that by forwarding interested volunteers to state elections officials we may contribute to smooth, fair and legal elections in all 50 U.S. states," he wrote in a blog on the group's website. "Furthermore, we hope that those who seem so shocked and outraged that Americans are concerned about stopping voter fraud will own up to their actions and stop committing vote fraud."

McCaffrey told FoxNews.com in an interview that nearly 500 people have volunteered so far -- about 100 of them in Arizona.

Part of the concern for voter fraud monitors is a result of a ruling this week by a federal appeals court that stripped the state of its ability to request proof of citizenship when residents register to vote. State officials say the ruling could increase the likelihood of voter fraud but not in next week's midterms because the deadline for registration passed before the decision.

At Arizona polls, voters must show one piece of identification that includes their name, address and photograph, such as a driver's license. They also can provide two forms of ID with their names and address, such as a utility bill or bank statement. Voters can also provide one form a acceptable photo ID with another form of non-photo ID that includes their name and address, such as a passport and a utility bill.

Arpaio declined to comment, but McCaffrey told FoxNews.com that he apologized to the sheriff Thursday for using his name without his permission. Arpaio, he said, stepped down as honorary co-chairman.

"He'll continue to support us but he didn't want an official title with the group while he was being investigated by everyone with a badge at the White House," he said, alluding to the Justice Department's investigation into whether Arpaio's office was discriminating against Hispanics with its crackdown on illegal immigrants. 

Monterroso said he's happy the Justice Department is sending poll watchers, even if it's not in response to his group's letter. 

"I think it's the right thing to do," he said. "It's better to be safe than sorry. If they have people out there, we want to make sure people vote without fear of intimidation or harassment by anyone else."

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Justice Department, New Mexico Reach Agreement on MOVE Act Enforcement

The Department of Justice has reached an agreement with New Mexico election officials to force compliance with a federal law aimed at protecting military voting rights — the latest in a series of enforcement actions against states that failed to send out all their military and overseas absentee ballots by federally mandated deadlines.

The New Mexico agreement was part of a lawsuit filed late Tuesday charging election officials from six counties with violating federal law; it came just hours after the Justice Department filed a complaint against the state of New York, and it followed filings against Guam earlier this month and against Wisconsin in September.

“The Department continues to work with states to investigate and remedy any problems that will prevent our men and women serving overseas from having the opportunity to vote and have their votes counted,” Justice Department spokeswoman Xochitl Hinojosa told FoxNews.com.

These actions come amid the ongoing debate over how to enforce compliance with the 2009 Military and Overseas Voters Empowerment Act, known as the MOVE Act, which is intended to ensure that overseas ballots are sent, received and counted on time. A provision of the law requires states to mail out absentee ballots 45 days before an election.

The complaint against the state of New Mexico and its secretary of state, Mary Herrera, charges that six counties — Curry, Los Alamos, McKinley, Rio Arriba, Sandoval and Taos — failed to transmit their ballots in time and were in violation of the law.

The Justice Department’s agreement with New Mexico, called a consent decree, says that without the filing, military and overseas voters “will not be provided the time specified under Federal law to receive, mark, and submit their ballots in time to have those ballots counted in the November 2, 2010 Federal general election.”

Secretary of State Mary Herrera’s office issued a press release on Wednesday in response to the lawsuit.

“While we have every reason to believe that all of these ballots have sufficient time to be returned, we want to do everything possible for our service men and women, and other overseas voters, to have their votes count,” Herrera said. “Every vote must count, and our coordination with the DOJ will make sure our military and overseas voters have every possible chance to return their ballots.”

“This coordinated action will give our voters every available opportunity to return their ballots,” she said. “We want to ensure that every vote counts!”

This month, former Justice voting section attorney Eric Eversole’s nonprofit organization, Military Voter Protection Project, sent a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder saying that it had conducted surveys with election officials around the country and found that numerous states and counties were in possible violation of the MOVE Act.

The MVP Project letter named numerous New Mexico counties that appeared in the Justice Department’s lawsuit against the state.

"We are obviously pleased that the Justice Department has taken action in New Mexico in response to our Sept. 27 letter," Eversole told FoxNews.com on Wednesday. "That letter, however, identified a number of counties in several other states with suspected MOVE Act violations. We will not be satisfied until each and every military voter is protected." 

J. Christian Adams, a former Justice Department voting section attorney who is now a conservative blogger, says these actions might be too little, too late.

“The New Mexico lawsuit demonstrates that a private organization was able to detect noncompliance with the law when the DOJ could not," he said. "The MVP Project detected the problems in New Mexico; the DOJ did not. In contrast, the same private organization detected failures in Alabama and Arkansas, and the DOJ hasn’t done a thing yet.".

“The DOJ knew months ago that states including New York, Wisconsin and Colorado were violating the law," Adams continued. "They could have sued in June. Instead they waited until the last minute and military voters there don’t enjoy the 45 days before the election that Congress promised them.  [Attorney] General Holder doesn’t have the power to rewrite laws.  Forty-five days before means 45 days before.” 

Earlier on Tuesday, the Justice Department filed a complaint against the state of New York and its board of elections for its "failure to ensure that election officials in Niagara, Putnam, Westchester, Erie, Richmond, Bronx, New York, Kings, and Queens Counties transmitted absentee ballots by October 1," which was the second deadline missed by the counties, after the state had been given a waiver for missing its earlier deadline. The last five counties named compose all of New York City.

“Our laws guarantee that uniformed service members and other overseas citizens will have a meaningful opportunity to participate in the elections of our nation’s leaders,” said Thomas E. Perez, assistant attorney general for the Civil Rights Division.

“This suit seeks both immediate and permanent relief to ensure that New York’s military and overseas voters, many of whom are members of our armed forces and their families serving our country around the world, can exercise their right to vote and have their votes counted in the upcoming federal elections.”

Douglas Kellner, co-chairman of the state board, told FoxNews.com earlier Tuesday that he expected an agreement to be filed in conjunction with an official complaint outlining how the violations would be corrected. But no agreement was filed.

On Sunday, FoxNews.com reported exclusively that the four New York counties and New York City had missed the deadline.

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