When Ugly gets Really Ugly…
McGlynn, a former chairman of the St. Clair County Republican Party, said he had received “specific information” that Democrats planned to buy votes, particularly in East St. Louis, with cash and crack cocaine. McGlynn declined to identify the Democratic officials who he said had provided him with that information.
Robert Sprague, the St. Clair County Democratic chairman, dismissed McGlynn’s allegations as “hogwash.” Sprague said the Democrats were planning an aggressive get-out-the-vote push for Tuesday but declined to describe those efforts in detail.
McGlynn said he had delivered to the St. Clair County clerk’s office and the East St. Louis Election Board lists of hundreds of registered voters that he had cross-referenced with names from local obituary pages. He described voter fraud as a “real, legitimate problem” with a long history in St. Clair County.
Last month, former East St. Louis election judge Leander Brooks received an 18-month prison term for forging the signatures on ballot applications in the November 2002 election, allowing unregistered or otherwise illegitimate voters to cast the ballots.
And in 2001, former East St. Louis City Councilman Michael Collins was sentenced to 18 months of probation for vote fraud involving the East St. Louis School Board election in 1995.
Murnane, with the Illinois Civil Justice League, said he also was suspicious about the Madison County Democratic Team’s plans for $62,000 that prominent asbestos attorney Randy Bono and his East Alton personal injury firm, SimmonsCooper, donated to the group on Friday (10/22/04).
“Why do they need all that money?” Murnane asked. “We are concerned with what kind of money that group will spend on Election Day activities – and what they will spend it on.”
