Focus 580; Down and Dirty: The Plot to Steal the Presidency

In the first hour of the show today we will look back to last year's presidential election contest in Florida and our guest is Jake Tapper. He's Washington correspondent for the online magazine Salon and he's authored a book that's just out recently that looks at what happened in Florida last year and during the election and after the title of his book is down and dirty The Plot to Steal the Presidency. It is published by Little Brown and is in bookstores now if you want to look at it. We'll talk about the book this morning with Jake Tapper and if you have questions you certainly are welcome to call. All we ask of people who call in is that people just try to be brief and we ask that so we can keep things moving along getting as many people as possible. But anybody is welcome to call. We'll try to get as many folks as we can. The number here in Champaign Urbana 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. We also have toll free line good anywhere you can hear us and that is 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5. So if it would be a long distance call use the toll free line and we'll pay for the call. Again 800 to two to WRAL and if you're here in Champaign-Urbana where we are

and use that local line it's three three three. W-why allowed Mr. Tapper Hello. Hi how are you doing. I'm good thanks thanks very much for talking with us. Of course a couple weeks ago a study was published so a study was done jointly by MIT Massachusetts Institute technology and the California Institute of Technology looking at the election last year and what they concluded was something between 4 million and 6 million Americans either failed to cast votes or their votes were invalidated in the presidential election because of a number of things faulty equipment ballots that were mismarked screw ups at the polling places. Problems with their registration which mood leads me to wonder whether in fact what we saw happen in Florida in terms of irregularities was any worse than any place else in this country. It was worse than most places not the worse no one or I might add but it certainly was worse then than most. Places but I mean lumping in people who

didn't vote with us. You know people who voted to have problems with the machines is not entirely fair I don't think. But certainly you don't get the larger point it seems like you're making that then we've got some work to do as a nation. I want to come to making sure that people know how to vote correctly. That is certainly well thank you no. Well I guess I was just thinking mostly about the fact that after the election when all of these irregularities came to light in Florida the news organizations various places around the country started looking at you know what happened in their neighborhood and found that there were problems similar kinds of problems in many places that makes you wonder about the outcome of any election. Yeah. What happened in four of the Harmonic Convergence in Florida was that for instance the Illinois had I think more under. It's overvotes ballots that were scrapped that were not red then than Florida did but the margin of victory for Al Gore

in Illinois exceeded exceeded the margin of victory of George Bush in Florida by by many many thousands. There were for instance 16000 scraps of ballots in New Jersey. But that's the state that Al Gore won by hundreds of thousands of votes over George Bush so it was the combination of the narrow margin of victory for George Bush being credibly narrow margin with one of the largest amounts of unread ballots in the nation that made Florida unique to this election but you're the larger point is correct of course is that there are a lot of ballots all over the country that don't get read and it's not fair to blame it all on the Florida specifically looking at Florida. We've had recounts and recounts news organizations have gone back and looked at some but not all of the ballots. Some of the places where there was a question. About what the outcome was. Now do you think

anyone really knows what the correct vote tally in the state of Florida in the presidential election last year was. Now and we never will. In fact interesting enough just last week it was revealed I think by the Chicago Tribune poll I'm giving all sorts of I want to reference this today. I think by the Chicago Tribune that in Palm Beach County they no longer even have the records of how the ballots were counted on the first night and in the subsequent counts that software has been deleted or something. So no there's there's really no record all we have is the record of what took place on election night and then during the recounts and then we're really left to guess and wonder as to as to what the real outcome would have been had either Bush or Gore. And this is the larger point in my book having either one of them actually tried to find out who really won Florida. And it was there. Well it seemed to the Bush strategy was pretty clear. As

soon as they got what I guess would have been the first official recount the one that was presided over announced by Katherine Harris that said they won that what they wanted to say was OK that's it it's done. We won. And that. They didn't really want to talk about doing much of anything in the way of recounts. The as far as the Gore side goes the perception I think a lot of people had was the how they were interest in a recount but only if it would make sure that they won so they didn't want to talk about doing something as radical and men all theoretically difficult as saying OK let's recount the entire state of Florida at any point did anybody seriously consider doing just that saying OK let's start all over again a recount every vote in the state. There were there were people who considered it but it never never got to the point where anybody who mattered I was willing to make a step you might remember Al Gore did twice offer a statewide recount say that he would go along with one of Bush wanted

one but he could. He could easily have said that knowing that probably the Bush people wouldn't. Right exactly and of course he did and of course what he was pushing for at the time was a recount of the unread ballots in four Democratic leaning counties when in fact you know there were under votes and over it's all over the state. And if you're going to it seems to me to be only fair that if you're going to call for a start. Look I flew into Florida on the day on a November 9 early morning November 9th I had been in Austin Texas with with Governor Bush. I flew into Florida every night and reading in the paper that there were one hundred seventy five thousand unread balance in Florida and at that point Bush had a margin of victory. That was under a thousand and was shrinking by the hour. And. I was just amazed and I like you and like I'm sure all your listeners wanted to know wow well who won those hundred seventy five thousand votes because that that's really the answer that's really how you figure out what happen because you have all these complaints about

you know butterfly ballots and people not knowing how to use the machines and the machines not counting properly. Well let's let's let's do a recount as happens all the time all over the country. You know that there were this is not the first recount not only in American history but this is not the first recount in Florida history either. They take place all all the time it's in 1088 there was a statewide recount in Florida for a Senate race. And let's just do the recount fight. What happens but. That you know the Gore people said no we're just going to do it we're going to try to get a recount in these four Democratic counties because we think we figure we can get enough votes to win just based on those four counties and the Bush people said no we already won. And I thought that neither approach was fair or respectful to the voters of Florida. There was a lot of confusion that night aided and abetted by the networks in the way that they were reporting the results which in part led to this the

famous exchanges between Mr. Bush and Mr. Gore where initially Gore called to concede and then called to concede. Right. And fortunately they managed to make a decision before Mr. Gore actually went out in public and stood up and said Thanks for your former Thanks for your support but you know it's all over with. Would it have been possible. For there to have been less confusion on there but I mean part I mean is there any excuse for the campaigns to be so confused about what really was going on or would you not blame them and say well you know we can't blame because everybody was confused. What was going on. I mean everybody was confused but I don't know how many of your of your listeners have ever read of the fantastic book by Malcolm Gladwell called The Tipping Point and the point of the book The Tipping Point is that you know while we all tend to think of history and events as like weather fronts coming in you know these large uncontrollable masses of just state changing events in actuality history is often

quite often changed by one individual here one individual there responding to a certain particular set of circumstances and that happened all the time on election night. Michael Hooley who was one of course chief aides in charge of the field you know getting the vote and getting out the vote. And you know that sort of thing. Michael Lee was sitting there while you know Gore people were crying thinking you know why Al Gore's daughters were crying in the in the hotels. You know 14 stories up. Michael Hooley was sitting there getting response from his man on the ground in Tallahassee Florida saying that this thing wasn't over and that you know Gore should not concede. Michael Boley. One of his assistants a guy named Jeff Yarbrough without even thinking kind of like radar Riley and mash you know Yarbrough is like trying to reach somebody to track down Gore to make sure that he doesn't do anything stupid. Gore meanwhile is in the limo on his way to the War Memorial to concede.

And it's only through you know the modern communication methods like pagers and cell phones that that would stop if this election had happened. You know 20 years ago. Twenty four years ago Gore would have conceded because they wouldn't have had the way to get to him in time. Well then in the though in light of the fact that there was this automatic recount required if he had conceded would that have made any difference. They wouldn't then the election officials would have said well Mr. Gore has conceded that there was still would have had to. When a recount what. Well yes and no. You have to remember a couple things one there. You're right to say that there because of Bush's margin of victory election night was less than one half of one percent there was a state mandated recount. But most counties in Florida did not actually do that recount most of the counties in Florida. And remember most counties in Florida were Bush counties. Gore won populous counties like Broward and Miami Dade and Palm Beach but he did not

win and just in the same way that Bush won more counties across the country but not more people. That's you know a way to look at Florida as well and most counties were did not do that state mandated recount some of them just Katherine Harris who was a very very partisan individual. And really it's. The book defends Katherine Harris on a number of partisan Democrat charges against her. You know making fun of her make up rumors about her personal life that sort of thing. But Katherine Harris in terms of her being the most the elections official of the state that doesn't have THAT IS AN HOUR a shame that a woman so partisan and so compromised was put in charge of these decisions. She told these counties that it was OK for them not to do the candidate the recount if they didn't want to if they wanted to just like double check that their software was working. That was enough. So your point who know and I guess what I'm saying is who knows what would have happened because Katherine Harris was so

partisan and so unfair and bent over backwards so much for the George Bush side of things that even if Gore had conceded if Gore had conceded you're saying Well wouldn't the law have required the recount anyway. Who knows what she would have done. Who knows what she would have done we're finding out stuff today that in the papers in Florida that you know remember she got in and she offered an extension. It gets really complicated and I want to bore your listeners but she did offer an extension for the counties that wanted and you know some extra time to do the recounts. And she said she would you know make an announcement based on their requests for an extension but it came out today that she'd already written her rejection letter before those requests for an extension had had even been filed. Our guest this morning in this. Focus 580 Jake Tapper he is Washington correspondent for Salon the online magazine and is the author of a recent book that looks at what happened last year in Florida in the presidential election the title of his book is down

and dirty The Plot to Steal the Presidency published by Little Brown. We have a couple of callers here ready to go and would be very happy to talk with folks. The number here in Champaign Urbana 3 3 3 9 4 5 5 and toll free 800 2 2 2 9 4 5 5 first color here is in Belgium. And that's line number four below. Oh yeah. There are sure. History and had last week. He had a listener from San Francisco that pointed out that they're one of Bush's ancestors was particularly interested with the Nationalist Socialist Nationalist Socialist Party and I'm sure many an early portions of the Second World War. And yet they were finally told to stop and then we know George the First. His father was involved with the CIA in many of these various things down in Central America. It seems to me if you want to look at the history of the family they're not at all opposed to doing things

that might influence things fun just like this Katherine Harris. And from there was one else a brother and a pivotal state. It seems to me it goes without saying that there was some kind of hanky panky someplace. Well Mr. Tapper you want to respond to that. But I mean I think you know I am not in the business of. Saying what I think is possible and I'm in the business of you know recording what did happen or what you know to the best of my ability to sift out the wheat from the chaff what you know what is history and a report that sort of thing I mean the caller has a point in that George Bush the first was director of the Central Intelligence Agency but does that mean I think that he was using spies to get you know his son the presidency and now does it mean that I think that the Bush family like a lot of political families Democrats too are you know if were ruthless and did what they needed to do to win in Florida. I do and I I think it's

possible that you know there's more that went on than meets the eye. But you know it's very tough to prove these things that's one that's one of the reasons why. Why I you know there are so few. Political corruption cases that are actually proven. Because you and it's usually it's you know for a guy like Rostenkowski. You know embezzling stamps it's never for any major people because those things people don't leave fingerprints. So I share the caller's skepticism but I don't know that I share his conviction that I that the you know anything untoward actually happened that involved the CIA. Oh I didn't mean that the CIA was involved I'm just saying influences were peddled. Well yeah I mean you have these this is a ruthless family just just you know but the big you know the Gore people were ruthless too. We're still going have has no room no shining armor to stand in. Thank you very much I want to swab that was one of Gore's problems in this election is is more in any election and in the recount is that if

you had said during the recount you know while we have one hundred seventy five thousand Floridians whose ballots were not counted let's just count them all. Let the chips fall where they may. You know get Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter in here put them in charge of it all and let's just do this. But no he and his team decided to you know manipulate Florida law to pursue. Vote recounting in four Democratic counties and to those counties were packed just because they were Democratic counties where there were votes that maybe they thought they could win. The other two were chosen because of voter voting irregularities. Volusia County and Palm Beach County but Broward and Miami Dade were only chosen because they were Democratic counties. That's something that Gore officials will tell you right off the bat. And I don't want to but to find a point in asthma for people who are listening I just want to make sure that they understand that this is not your you're not making a partisan statement here that you're seen to be saying that both sides in this were willing to do

whatever to win yet did whatever the side of the law a right line of law. Yes both. It's seem to me that both sides were that it was a war between CVS to agree that a statesman was needed and you know the were some individuals out there a few of them even Republicans who were saying you know what it seems to me it seems to me we need to do a statewide recount and then just decide what happens. Chuck Hagel senator from Nebraska a conservative Republican supported Bush. He said. We need to do a statewide recount I don't understand either side what either side is arguing here. But people like that are few and far between in American politics usually they follow the party line. Another caller here next is Rantoul. That's line number. Hello. Hi I just had a factual question about something the caisson earlier about the four Democratic counties that the Democrats won it counted and suggesting that that was unfair. And I just wanted to. Clarify a misunderstanding.

My understanding had been that the Florida law only allowed for a party to challenge the results in three or four counties so that that was really all that they could do that they couldn't by law challenge the results statewide and they could only pick a certain number of counties to challenge it in. That's no that's not right. They could have they could have asked for a statewide count they could have asked for a county by county count. There is nothing limiting you to three or four counties now what there was was it that would be a very daunting task bureaucratically to try to get to send a Democratic lawyer to each one of Florida's 67 counties and ask for a recount. But there was nothing in the law that said they couldn't do it. And also you have to be a master member there are two phases. Of challenging an election there was the protest saying in which you could pick out counties and then there was the contest phase really where anything could happen. But the core people in order to get to the contest phase which is when

you know you get before a judge and you say this is what we want let's order a statewide recount or whatever in order to get to that phase you have to the election has to be certified. And the Gore people did not want the election certified because they thought and they were right that public relations wise that would be bad for Gore because people would be like Well Bush has been certified the president. Let's just get this over with. So they tried to avoid that at all costs. But unfortunately what that man is and they were they found an ally in the Florida Supreme Court which offered them an extension on the certification. But what that meant was that when it came time for the contest phase which is really when the whole statewide recount could have taken place if if not before you can do it in either protest or contest probably easier to do it in the contest phase in that phase. They had much they had far less time because they got the extension on phase one. And you know I get it. It gets complicated but the point is that all of this was unprecedented on a presidential level and the Gore team could have made the argument let's do a statewide

recount. Let's do with my you know the Republican Senator Chuck Hagel says it's cetera and Cliff take it from there in fact there were people on the Gore team who thought that the plan was that they were just going to try to run up of a margin of victory in the protest phase in these four Democratic counties. And then in the contest phase whoever was behind whether it was Bush or Gore would then say OK well now let's do it a statewide recount no matter what. And these Gore lieutenants were very upset when not only the fact by the fact that Gore was still behind when it came time for the contest phase but that when it came to that what they had been told that now they were going to do it statewide was not true that when it came time for the contest phase the Gore senior staffers decided we're just going to we're just going to try to get 51 votes here in a hundred votes there and 300 votes there and that will add up to a victory as opposed to going for the statewide that they had been under the impression they're going to try for all along.

The quick follow up in the morning up and listen. I'm curious based on the amount of research you've done whether you think that your book or other book on the topic now are definitive or whether you think it's possible that in years to come more information will come to light that will test the process in a different light. Thank you. OK thank you. You know you think there's more yet to be learned. I would be low as a journalist I'd be loath to say that mine is the definitive version. You know especially because as is the tendency in news and in history so much tends to come out 10 20 30 years down the road especially after a few players have passed on etc.. But that said I haven't seen very much in any of the subsequent books that makes me think like I wish I had pursued other avenues I mean as of right now I'm pretty happy. I've never I've reserved the right to Reno retract that in the future.

It will go on here and let's go to Champagne next. Number two. Hello. Hi. I've been reading your book and it's really fascinating. About the statewide recount I thought I read in one of the early chapters that they had considered doing a state statewide recount at first but they didn't have the resources to battle all the Republican candidates inboards. Yeah that's right. That's what they thought early on they thought that they didn't have the resources to do it. But there's also the argument that they they didn't think they had to because they weren't they weren't pursuing a course of what is best for Florida or even listening to their recount experts. This this was one of the things that I thought was most interesting First off thanks for reading the book I appreciate it and thanks for your nice words. But there were there are people who make a living as recount lawyers and Gore had a couple of

them. With him on the ground in Florida a guy named Jack Young a guy named Chris Souter. These are these were recount experts. Are these the guys that wrote the recall recount primmer. Exactly they were they wrote the recount primer and one of the lessons in the recount primer and this is in the in the postscript of the book but it will be ruining it for you. But one of the lessons they learned is that there was a there was a recount in the early 80s in Indiana. It was just a House race but it was called Indiana's bloody eighth because it was a very very heated debate in the U.S. Congress and the Democrats did not adhere to the lessons learned from Indiana's bloody eighth from the lessons that the Republicans to the mistakes of the Republicans made in that in that the Republicans in that race in Indiana pursued a method of recounting the ballots that was on its face allowable by law. But when you take a step

back it seemed unfair. And so the U.S. Congress was able to come in and wipe the slate clean and say no we need it we need to do things differently. Because this is this is unfair you're excluding some balance here. You're including other ballots there and that's just not fair. And it's funny because that's almost exactly what happened to the Democrats on a national level when it came to Florida because they pursued what was legal in Florida but was also would but it set a state the stage so that the U.S. Supreme Court could come in and maybe they were inclined to do so but of course they were inclined to do so to come in and say this is not being conducted in a fair way and the recount experts Jack and Chris Souter were pushing indeed as you say for a statewide recount. Right off the bat because they thought that was the best method that was the most fair method. And also frankly the best likelihood they had of winning you know if you're trying to win if you're trying to hit 50 home runs you don't you know you don't step up to the bat and

ask for 50 pitches you ask for 5000. And with each new ballot whether it was from a Republican district or not they were. Brevet presented with the opportunity for Gore to rack up more votes. I've got one I've got one more question. Yes. Could you address the differences between Texas law in Florida law and hand recounts. It seems to me that that Bush got away with one there. Oh you got that right. That was one of the most disingenuous things that I did and it frustrated me as a journalist on the ground to know and not only to hear these Bush people lying about this over and over. Well let me clarify. The Texas law and the Florida law are both equally vague. They both leave it up to the subjectivity of people who are who are reviewing the ballots. The intent of the voter as determined by whoever's reviewing the balance this is a law

that that then Governor Bush signed in 1997. Equally vague and equally vague law as the Florida law but one in favor of hand recounts as happens all over the country hand recounts. You know Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle all his first race for House only came you know he was only sworn in officially after a year and a half because there was this lengthy recount in the state of South Dakota in his district I mean it happens all the time. His is number two the deputy majority leader Harry Reid went through a tough recount battle in his last re-election in Nevada very very common. It's just that you know as a country Americans don't tend to pay that much attention to it the media tends not to pay that much attention to it. It's you know as we saw in Florida it's kind of boring it. But that's sad.

Bush signed a recount long hand recount law and then when basically the same wall was up and Florida was being discussed. The Bushies acted as if the notion and the very notion of hand recounts was cropped was silly. How can people be counted on to judge these things fairly and impartially. And you're right. I mean he got away with it because I don't know why but it was. It was exactly what he had signed into law in Texas. Well in the past the midpoint here we have some other callers and I'd also like to introduce Again our guest We're speaking with Jake Tapper. He's Washington correspondent for the online magazine Salon and is the author of a book about what happened in Florida last year in the presidential race the title of his book is down and dirty The Plot to Steal the Presidency it's published by Little Brown. Questions welcome 3 3 3 W I L L toll free 800 1:58 W while when the campaigns realized there was going to be this recount they knew that they were going to have to have people there on the ground representing their interests and to lead the the two efforts they selected these

two former secretaries of state for the Democrats it was Warren Christopher for the Republicans it was James Baker. How did that choice of each of these men to lead the efforts to determine the character and the straw. The two sides pursued. Well quite a bit. James Baker who. Bush came to call General Baker by the end because he was so impressed with him. James Baker whether or not you critique you agree or approve of what he did in Florida. He did it really well. This is a guy who understood the world he was in he's a lawyer and a ruthless Politico and also has something of a gift for PR although I found him rather distasteful when I was in Florida. And then you have Warren Christopher who was you know barely president. Only only six or seven years older than James Baker. But a lot more frail a lot less vigorous and

had had a more more demure more of a statesman type had. His wife. He had obligations back home his wife's best friend had just passed away. His daughter was second. And you know the disparity between those two generals really ended up manifesting itself in a far better shop operated in and out of the Bush camp. We have other callers here let's get back to them southeastern Illinois. Next it's line. Or for hello and made a statement earlier in the stings about the Mandarin Salon magazine not making a partisan remark. Adam Mayes been surprisingly adept in the main But if you take the title of the book down and dirty The Plot to Steal the president and the presidency you're about as partisan as you can get there. On which side. Well that are you assuming that both of them are playing down and dirty and

both are plotting to steal the presidency. Yeah and I do explain that. And the both in the forward and the postscript of the book but the plot is you know you can and you can read into it you can assign that plot to whichever side you want. Then in either case David been struck that they were in the right as so it really you know I mean it's just a matter of partisan judgement as to which group of groups you want. I mean it's right. But what I was going to say was two hypotheticals. Just as a hypothetical assume that Mr. Gore was as concerned about the health of the body politic of this country as well as Mr. Nixon. Well and quite possibly the election was stolen from him by Mike Kennedy in Illinois and Texas particularly. And he said no you know it's going to tear up the nation if we right turn

that and let it go. Dorothy Gore had been a statesman had there had been had the concern for the country that Mr. Nixon had been treated made a similar statement. And also what would be the hypothetical I wonder if Mr. Gore and those who have been rallying around him since the election. Rallying around the fact that he should have won here. Who would be the junior senator in the state of Missouri and you know they the Democrats ran that ran a dead man and. And the state of Missouri and the dead man was elected I mean it's an old political tradition to vote in stones but when you start electing tombstones I think that's going a little bit too far. That well didn't that didn't contest that he did let it go at that and that's how he wound up as attorney general

he wouldn't be attorney general of that. Yes I mean you know I just don't think you can be a valid candidate. Don't want your day I mean they could have run a write in vote for his widow but of course they wouldn't want to write in votes because people don't write in to my family because I think what had happened. Sir were you not then you have to know I kind of jump in again I want to give you a chance to respond and then I hope the caller would forgive me because we're getting into our last 10 minutes and I have three other people. OK to try to get them to make a quick I'm out. The what happened in Missouri I'll just not touch just because that's not relevant to the book. Although I certainly understand what the caller was saying in terms of Nixon I did Nixon does make a number of appearances in the book. Interestingly one of Bush's attorneys a guy named Fred Bartlett was when he had just gotten out of law school in 1960 sent to Texas as a young associate attorney to investigate voter fraud on behalf of the Republican

Party. And here and this is one of the biggest myths in history that Nixon was somehow this great statesman certainly can be argued that he was a greater statesman in this respect than Al Gore was. But Nixon didn't formally concede defeat in 1016 until three days after the election and he did so by his own admission which thought that the recount would take up to half a year and with consideration of his future political viability foremost in his mind he makes and gets into this in his memoirs. But the Republican Party did begin investigating allegations about Illinois about voter fraud in Illinois in Texas and there were invent all sorts of investigations. The RNC chairman at the time a guy named Senator Thurston Morton of Kentucky flew to Chicago announced the formation of the national recount and fair elections committee it cetera. This is. A lot of stuff was going on but you know behind closed doors and secretly and not so much in front of the cameras as it was

but Nixon was not I did not concede defeat immediately. And in fact the Republican Party was considering challenging the Kennedy presidency out well past the election. But I do get into that in the book. We have about 10 minutes left. Our guest again Jake Tapper from Salon. And we're talking about last year's presidential contest in Florida and we'll try to get in as many callers who began the time the remains will go on next to somebody in Champaign this is line 1. Hello. Hello. Getting back to the recount. I would like to ask you Mr. Blake was quite adamant in Florida about not continuing the recount many times over. Yet I understand that some Western states. I believe it was Washington State was one of them. HATTAWAY a recount. And it was a

science and the Bush camp. About the only media outlet I found it then was the New York Times. And I'm wondering if the media learned a lesson from this election and in future will be more alert. It seems some of the information that was not reported are lost. I had a lot more and then they led us to believe another was of course the people running into one of the places where recounts were being held and you heard varying reports of violence are no violence whatever. Thank you. OK Mr. Tapper. Well as it were pursued possible recounts in other states. By Republicans

and I mean there was a huge a disconnect in between what the what the Bush people said about Florida and what they thought about doing in other states in terms of recounts in New Mexico being the most glaring example. But in the end there were not these recounts. They kept the options open but in the end they did not they did not actually pursue them. But I do you know I think there are a lot of lessons for the media to learn from. From the Florida mess and. I do not share. I don't think that those lessons will be learned except for possibly calling a state before all the polls in the state have closed. That's probably the only one in my opinion that the media will change its behavior on. That was one thing I do want to ask about because there are certainly there were a lot of complaints about the way the media makes and broadcast projections about results and afterwards a lots of culpas in the media saying yeah we know we've got a problem we'll look at this but one

wonders if in the next time around whether anything really is going to be any different. Well I think that states well I think that the media outlets will be more circumspect when it comes to calling a stymie. This is this was a charge that the Bush people make that is a very valid charge. The fact that networks called the state of Florida for Gore before the polls in the western part of the state which is a much more Republican part of the state before they were closed is a very offensive occurrence by the media. You know probably it's probably counter-balance by the fact that you know when a Dem decision to call Florida for Bush in the end the first network to do so was Fox News Channel and the guy at the decision desk was Bush's first cousin a guy named John Allen. But you know I was that was not a good moment for the media. OK let's go to Urbana. This is line number two.

Hello. Hi thanks for the show. Two quick questions. Is it true as I've heard that the first recount that was requested in Florida was by the Republican Party in Seminole County on the night. And what can you say briefly about the. For lack of a better phrase the fellow in this thick voter roll that was purchased by the state of Florida from Texas. Thank you. Two issues there Seminole County I don't know of. There was in several counties something of a recount not full hand recount but there's something of a re-examination of the ballots in several counties where Bush won that were not it was not covered. I did not receive the same kind of media attention and certainly being that they were Bush counties where Bush ended up picking up votes in a lot of times some of these areas that the Bush people did not complain about a lot of them are detailed in my book. The following is the voting rolls as it is a huge issue.

One that gets to you know some of the more egregious violations of. I want to say violations of the law but certainly violations of the pact between a public official and the voters what did happen was in the state of Florida 1998 began buying the hiring a private company to keep lists of felons who did not have the right to vote and so that they could be gleaned from the voting rolls because in 1997 in a mayor's race in Florida a lot of felons voted and the whole election was thrown out. But the voting rolls were from by this private company with a company that didn't have a lot of Republican ties. We're not perfect. To say the least and a lot of individuals who have the right to vote were denied the right to vote and canvassing board and elections officials complained about this to Katherine Harris the secretary of state and Clay Roberts the division of elections chief and they didn't

really do anything about it. Now where it gets into. Conspiracy theories is in the simple fact that for a whole bunch of reasons we don't have to go into now. Obviously felons are disproportionately are disproportionately minorities are represented in prisons and so if you are looking to take away the voting rights of somebody with the stereotypically African-American name like you know I don't even know Ronny Ronny Jones Ryan Jackson or from somebody with a stereotypically Latino name Miguel Domingo's or something like that. And you are disenfranchising somebody with that name you're taking away his right to vote. But you're taking away the right to vote of a different Ronnie Jones Ronnie Jackson or Miguel Domingo. You are therefore disproportionately taking away the right to vote of minorities who you know have every right to vote. And the fact that Katherine

Harris and her division of elections chief were so unconcerned by this even though the cold point's been going on for years is seen as at the very least a sort of benign racism. It's hard to make that charge without proof. These people did this on purpose. But it's certainly no great leap to say that if they had been disproportionately disenfranchising people with the name Charles Winthrop that maybe they would not have been a little bit more active on fixing those sort of roles. Let's go to another urban. This is line 3. Hello. Yes it's an action that is growing but is it cannot be in Chicago. No fraud and certainly everyone is now writes about it agrees that with some fraud in Chicago. Absolutely. But counterbalancing that is the probability that was even more fraud downstate in the Republican areas. So that if Nixon had called a recount it probably would have

lost votes and he had broken. And that had a lot to do with their decision not to request the recall account. I mean you know you're with that aren't you. I know and I would not argue with that there certainly were allegations of voter fraud in fact. If you get into histories of Illinois in November in Illinois voting in November 1960 it's almost becomes like a strange game of tennis for people with people down state holding their election returns people in Chicago holding their downstate they really saw Chicago they released some of their etc.. You know without question the Chicago machine was was was crooked as a pillock surprise warning investigation by The Chicago Tribune revealed you know in the early 100 days. But but you're right I mean there was there was fraud more than enough fraud to go around on both sides. Yes no one has a regrettable history. Look what I really wanted to ask about was the things not directly in the election but. The charge is due to his put up making it difficult to get polling places.

People have apparently registered but not be appearing on the rules. Do these charges actually hold up. Well again it's tough to I mean some of them do yes. But but again not in the way that night and not in any sort of easily identifiable or prosecutorial way. You can say there was a Florida highway patrol checkpoint that was put up a mile from a two thirds black precinct in Tallahassee outside Tallahassee in Leon County. And that checkpoint did not go by the regular rules and regulations they did not get the did not get clearance for it before they did it. But can you prove that they did that to like stop blacks from voting when in fact for the previous month they've been setting up checkpoints all over the state because the state was short of the Florida Highway Patrol is short of funds and it save them gas money to just run checkpoints every now and then you know you can't

prove it. And yeah I mean it is true and it is suspicious. But Suspicious isn't enough. It could have then have been freelancing but done so with the knowledge that they would probably be retribution for it that the affair since it's possible. I mean that doesn't take conspiracy. It doesn't take complicity then but it can create a really bad situation and state that once was much worse. It's possible but I have to say you know the Gore people did look at all sorts of allegations of civil rights and the most offensive thing they found that a guy named Henry Latimer who was and have a very successful Fort Lauderdale attorney an African-American the Gore team put in charge of this sort of thing and the most offensive thing he found Yes there were anecdotes here and there about all sorts of malfeasance or charges of you know these two white people were let into vote let you know the last minute and a whole line of black people wanted Senator

but I'm the most offensive thing where were all the individuals in the African-American precincts whose ballots were not counted because they voted wrong or the machine screwed up somewhere. I'm going to jump in here and another really sorry to have to say we're at the end but we are in we have another call that we can't take Are we at the end of the time we could keep going I'm sure but for people who are interested in reading about this the story is covered in great depth and detail in the book that we mentioned so you can look for that it's titled down and dirty The Plot to Steal the Presidency it's published by Little Brown by Jake Tapper. He is Washington correspondent for Salon the online magazine Mr. Tapper want to say thanks very much for talking with us today. Oh it's my pleasure thank you very much.