Votes for sale in East St. Louis

This comes our way from the Belleville News-Democrat, one of the best online news outlets. They regularly update their AP wire.

But this excellent article was written by one of their own reporters, George Pawlaczyck. I blogged about this yesterday, apparently votes are for sale in East St. Louis, IL.

According to Pawlaczyk:

During a telephone conference call heard by an FBI undercover informant, Mark Kern was told that the going $5 rate to pay voters might have to be doubled because black voters considered him a racist, according to testimony Wednesday in a federal vote fraud trial.

Kern, the former Belleville mayor and current St. Clair County Board chairman, said the testimony was "absolutely untrue." He is not accused of wrongdoing.

Dannita Youngblood, 30, testified during the trial of five Democratic politicians in East St. Louis that one of the defendants, her former East St. Louis city hall boss Kelvin Ellis, told Kern during the October call that the price to pay a voter would have to be increased. In October, Kern was the Democratic candidate for the chairman's job.

Under questioning by Assistant U.S. Attorney Mike Carr, Youngblood was asked whether she was certain that Ellis talked to Kern about buying votes.

"Yes sir, he (Ellis) stated that," answered Youngblood, who said she was then considered to be a member of Ellis' political "A-team" and was not suspected of being a spy.

Click here for the entire article, click here for yesterday's East St. Louis blog posting.