Brad Friedman Byon 11/6/2012, 11:59am PT

Well, imagine that, the very first reported fraud of Election Day 2012 appears to have been committed by the supposedly anti-fraud, Rightwing "election integrity" group, True the Vote, in Ohio. Their election observers poll-challengers, as Plunderbund reports, "will not be allowed in Franklin County polling locations" today after they appear to have forged signatures of their very own volunteers...

Yesterday we reported that True the Vote was attempting to place observers at precincts in Central Ohio, focusing on African American districts. We also noted that there might be some problems with the forms they submitted to the Franklin County Board of Elections (FCBOE). The FCBOE met today and determined that True the Vote had likely falsified the forms submitted for general election observers. The new observer forms, filed over the past few days by True the Vote representative (and Hilliard Tea Party Member) Jan Loar, used candidate signatures copied from a previous set of forms filed in early October All but one (Scott Rupert, an independent for U.S. Senate) of the six candidates whose names appeared on the original form had withdrawn permission to use their signatures prior to the submission of today’s forms. During the BOE meeting Candidate Terri Jamison spoke up to say her name was “forged” on the latest round of forms. The form for appointing observers reads ‘election falsification is a 5th degree felony’. Election officials have confirmed that there will be a post-election investigation of True the Vote. The forms have been rejected unanimously by all members (Rs and Ds) on the board.

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Board member Zachary Manifold told us he was ”amazed that a group that goes to such extreme lengths to claim voting fraud in Ohio would knowingly forge or misuse signatures to try to gain access to Franklin County polling locations.”

Manifold might be "amazed", but we're not. We initially reported on the True the Vote scam artists back in 2010 when the "voter fraud" fraudsters initially announced their "non-partisan" "election integrity" efforts. It was clear at the time that they were little more than Republican operatives, who even used a faked up Photoshopped photograph to suggest "Democratic voter fraud" in their initial video announcing themselves.

The Columbus Dispatch confirms Plunderbund's report today, and adds this:

One person told the elections board that she attended True the Vote training sessions and the observers were instructed to use cameras to intimidate voters when they enter the polling place, record their names on tablet computers and send them to a central location, and attempt to stop questionably qualified voters before they could get to a voting machine. “You’re going to have problems galore,” she warned. Board members reassured her that such activity would violation elections law and poll workers would prohibit that kind of behavior.

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