True the Vote

True the Vote (TTV) is a conservative^[1][2] non-profit^[3] vote-monitoring organization whose stated objective is stopping voter fraud. True the Vote trains volunteers to be election monitors and to spot and bring attention to suspicious voter registrations that its volunteers believe are ineligible to vote. True the Vote strongly encourages citizens to be engaged during voting time, with its tag line, "If you see something at the polls that just doesn't seem right, record it."^[4] It also holds local rallies to promote voter-fraud prevention legislation such as voter ID laws.^[5] True the Vote is based out of Houston, Texas and their current president is Catherine Engelbrecht. Since founding True the Vote, Engelbrecht and her husband say they have been investigated by the IRS, FBI, ATF, and OSHA. She says she "absolutely" thinks she was targeted because she worked against voter fraud.^[6] Americans for Prosperity and other Republican-leaning independent groups have sponsored meetings featuring speakers from True the Vote, including Ms. Engelbrecht.^[7]

The progressive Internet outlet Talking Points Memo has criticized True the Vote for engaging in what it says is caging, voter intimidation, and advancing statements about the pervasiveness of voter fraud that it says are unfounded.^[8][9] In 2012, Democratic Congressman Elijah Cummings opened an investigation into the organization.^[10]

History

True the Vote began as an outgrowth of the King Street Patriots, a non-profit Tea Party organization founded by Catherine Engelbrecht^[7] and mostly active in Texas. Several members of the King Street Patriots, including its president, Ms. Engelbrecht, were dissatisfied with the voting process in Harris County, Texas during the 2008 election, especially the shortage of poll workers, which they believed "invited fraud and other problems at the polls."^[11]

2010 election cycle

In August of 2010, Harris County Voter Registrar Leo Vasquez told ABC news (Houston affiliate KTRK), "We have evidence indicating violations of the Texas election code, falsified documents being submitted to this governmental office and possibly violations of federal election laws." His office's investigation found 1,597 instances of multiple applications for the same voter, 1,014 applications for folks already registered to vote, 325 for teenagers who are too young to register and 25 from folks who admitted on the application they are not even US citizens. Vasquez said the applications were all gathered by paid deputies with the group Houston Votes. Of the 25,000 applications the group filed in the last three months (June, July, August 2010), only 7,193 were actually for new voters. ^[12]

True the Vote's activities during the 2010 election cycle were largely confined to Harris County, Texas^{[citation needed]}. True the Vote asserts that it uncovered numerous examples of voter fraud. For example, it states: "Vacant lots had several voters registered on them. An eight-bed halfway house had more than 40 voters registered at its address."^[13] During the election, the Texas Democratic Party accused True the Vote of voter intimidation in largely Hispanic and African-American polling areas.^[13]

Voter fraud and voter identification laws

True the Vote's website portrays voter fraud as largely a Democratic party problem. It routinely runs stories on election fraud being perpetrated by "liberals,"^[14] or "Democrats".^[15]

Like many groups pushing for strict voter ID laws, True the Vote asserts that voter fraud is widespread and deliberate, and relies on reports of individual incidents to support this assertion.^[16] True the Vote argues for stronger voter ID laws in every state, and resists attempts to relax or remove voter ID laws. On December 13, 2011, it held a rally in Austin, Texas to support a stricter ID law passed earlier that year.^[17]

True the Vote's 2012 national summit in Houston largely centered on charges of voter fraud. Speakers included ACORN "whistle-blower" Anita Moncrief, Hans Von Spakovsky of the Heritage Foundation, who insisted that "United States has a long history of voter fraud that has been documented by historians and journalists," and Fox News contributor Pat Caddell, who called opposition to voter ID Laws "the demise of our democracy" and "Slow motion suicide.”^[18]

2011-2012 Wisconsin recall effort

In 2012, True the Vote joined several other Tea Party groups in "Verify the Recall", an effort that opposes the attempted recall of Wisconsin governor Scott Walker in the Wisconsin gubernatorial recall election. True the Vote provided software that it had previously applied to check signatures in petitions in Texas.^[19] In order to electronically check over 1 million petition signatures, which had previously been posted online by the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board^[20] True the Vote recruited thousands of volunteers (mostly out of state) to manually enter signatures into True the Vote's electronic database. True the Vote says it recruited over 13,000 volunteers.^[21] True the Vote's website has run at least two stories suggesting that fraud is "rampant" in the recall effort, and frame the effort as decidedly political, saying that "we should not believe the claims of union-supporters and anti-Walker operatives who say that they collected more than one million signatures on petitions to recall Governor Scott Walker.".^[22]

On February 28, Walker called for the data gathered by the "Verify the Recall" effort to be used as an official challenge of the recall.^[23] This information was gathered and compiled entirely by True the Vote. True the Vote's executive summary contended that only 534,865 signatures gathered during the recall effort were valid.^[24] There is evidence that True the Vote used a flawed process to discount signatures on the ballot, and that most of the signatures it discounted are, in fact, accurate.^[25]

In the days before the June 5, 2012 recall election, True the Vote announced that it would be training volunteers to monitor polling places throughout Wisconsin, both online^[26] and at a small number of locations throughout the state^[27] True the Vote stated that hundreds of people showed up for training and later monitored the polls in Wisconsin,^[28] and that these monitors were necessary because of "discrepancies" in the recall petition process as well as "Wisconsin’s long history of election fraud." True the Vote pledged to man every polling place in Wisconsin on the day of the recall election, which drew sharp criticism from the Barret campaign.^[29]

Throughout the Wisconsin recall, True the Vote worked in concert with a group of local Tea Party groups including the "Wisconsin Grandsons of Liberty" and "We the People of the Republic", which helped True the Vote launch its recall signature verification efforts.^[30] True the Vote's efforts during the recall election itself were conducted with an unnamed group of tea party organizations throughout Wisconsin.^{[citation needed]}

Congressional investigation

In October 2012, Rep. Elijah Cummings, a Maryland Democrat initiated an investigation into alleged voter suppression by True the Vote. Cummings wrote a letter to founder Engelbrecht, raising questions about voter challenges in Ohio, North Carolina, Wisconsin and Maryland. He indicated that if the efforts to challenge voter registrations were "intentional, politically motivated and widespread across multiple states, they could amount to a criminal conspiracy to deny legitimate voters their constitutional rights."^[31]

2012 alleged forgery of signatures in Ohio

In 2012, True the Vote applied to the Franklin County Board of Elections to place polling observers in Columbus area districts with large African-American populations. A November 6, 2012, news report in the Cleveland Leader stated that the FBCOE in Ohio had "determined" five of the six signatures on the application were likely forged.^[32] Because this type of fraud is a fifth degree felony, the FCBOE declared that an investigation will be conducted after the election.^[33]

Catherine Engelbrecht responded to the allegations by saying that the signatures on the initial form were genuine, and, following Franklin County instructions, were copied onto subsequent forms. She said that prior to the placement of observers, the candidates rescinded their approval following threats of lawsuits. She said that the allegation of forgery was "blatant slander", and that William Anthony, the director of the FBCOE, was formerly the chairman of the county Democratic Party. She requested that Anthony release the timeline of events surrounding the allegations and clarify whether there was any coordination with the Democratic Party.^[34]

2013

In February 2013, True the Vote filed a federal lawsuit against St. Lucie County elections supervisor Gertrude Walker in Florida, claiming that she had failed to turn over public records related to the US House of Representatives election race between Allen West (R) and Patrick Murphy (D). They stated that withholding the documents violated the 1993 Motor Voter Law, which grants them permission to "publicly inspect and examine all voter registration and election records" in question.^[35]

In May 2013, it was revealed that True the Vote was one of the conservative groups subjected to additional scrutiny by the IRS in applying for tax-exempt status. ^[36][37] True the Vote told Breitbart.com that new revelations that the IRS was discriminating in 2012 against conservative non-profits came as no shock to them. "We applied for nonprofit C-3 status early in 2010," said Catherine Engelbrecht, president of True the Vote, which has come under heavy assault from the Left for alleged voter suppression. "Since that time the IRS has run us through a gauntlet of analysts and hundreds of questions over and over again. They've requested to see each and every tweet I've ever tweeted or Facebook post I've ever posted. They also asked to know every place I've ever spoken since our inception and to whom, and everywhere I intend to speak in the future. We've met all requirements, responded to everything, and provided case law in such areas where appropriate," Engelbrecht stated. "The IRS treatment of us lends to the appearance of a politically motivated abuse of power and an assault on free speech."^[38]

References

External links

• True the Vote website
• Catherine Engelbrecht Speaks at the Texas Tea Party Patriots PAC
• Is True the Vote Intimidating Minority Voters From Going to the Polls? November 2, 2012 Nightline article and video