Marathon Pundit: Illegal Wisconsin voter speaks from prison

Monday, May 21, 2007

Illegal Wisconsin voter speaks from prison

The 2004 election in Wisconsin, particularly in Milwaukee County, were a mess.

A reasonable person can argue that the Democrats stole the election from President Bush.

"Operation Elephant Takeover" was a scheme in which some paid staffers of the Democratic Party, including the adult children of two Milwaukee politicians, slashed the tires of over 100 vans rented by the Milwaukee Republican Party for an 2004 election day "get out the vote effort."

Four of the five defendants in the case received jail time for their criminal acts.

Leading up to that election, the Republican Party challenged the legitimacy of 5,600 registered voters on the Milwaukee voter rolls.

John Kerry eked out at 12,000 victory over President Bush that year.

Today's Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel writes about another troublemaker from that year, Kimberly Prude. A convicted felon who worked as a volunteer on the Kerry-Edwards campaign, she's now in serving time in prison for illegally voting in the presidential election.

Rather than accepting her fate, Prude initially tried to state her case through the media.

I tried to get help in the beginning, I wrote Oprah (Winfrey's) O Magazine. I got my daughter to call certain talk show hosts, Montel Williams, Maury Povich. There was no interest.

That's as it should be.

More from the Journal-Sentinel:

On Oct. 22, 2004, she volunteered for a rally that featured the Rev. Al Sharpton. As the rally ended, Sharpton encouraged the crowd to follow him to City Hall, where people could register to vote. Prude joined the crowd, registered to vote and then submitted an absentee ballot. While waiting in line, she said, she heard someone asking for people to work the election-day polls. Prude signed up.

Later, Prude said she notified her parole agent that she had a job as a poll worker and the agent told her she couldn't vote. Prude claimed she called the election commission to attempt to withdraw her ballot but that a person she spoke with told her not to worry about the vote.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Richard Frohling said Prude's story "changed repeatedly."