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Charlie Webster, the chairman of Maine's Republican Party, sees "dozens of black people" voting on Nov. 6 as evidence of voter fraud because "nobody in town knows anyone who’s black."

In an interview with WCSH's Don Carrigan earlier this week, Webster said that Democrats were winning elections because they blocked an effort by the Republican Party to repeal same-day voter registration, which requires an ID and proof of residency.

"Let's just look at what happened on Tuesday," he explained. "I mean, literally hundreds of new people came in. We don't know if they're residents or not but they came in and voted. And there's no way of knowing that."

"In some parts of the state -- for example, in some parts of rural Maine, there were dozens -- dozens of black people who came in and voted election day. Everybody has a right to vote, but nobody in town knows anybody that's black. How did that happen? I don't know, but we're going to find out."

When Carrigan pressed the party chairman for specifics about where fraud occurred, he vaguely referred to "several rural Maine towns" and promised an investigation to find out more.

"What I'm doing is purchasing a post card, we're going to mail it in and thank people for registering to vote and see whether it comes back," Webster said.

"So, you think the Democrats bussed in people?" Carrigan asked.

"I just think that the system, without some kind of an ID or without some kind of way to check, is fraught for abuse," Webster insisted. "I'm just telling you my personal opinion. I believe it's a problem."

Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan also recently pointed to African-American turnout to explain his loss to President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden.

“We were surprised with the outcome,” the Wisconsin Republican told WISC-TV’s Jessica Arp. “We knew this was going to be a close race. We thought we had a very good chance of winning it. I think that the surprise was some of the turnout, some of the turnout especially in urban areas, which definitely gave President Obama the big margin to win this race.”

(h/t: Think Progress)

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An election worker in Oregon is facing a criminal investigation for allegedly altering multiple ballots to benefit Republican candidates.

In a press release on Monday, Clackamas County spokesperson Tim Heider said that 55-year-old Deanna Swenson had been "relieved of duty immediately after the alleged ballot tampering was discovered."

Swenson, who was registered as a Republican, was accused of filling in a Republican straight ticket on ballots where voters did not specify a choice.

Contacted by Willamette Week, Swenson tearfully insisted that it was "only the two" ballots that had been altered.

The Oregon Department of Justice began an investigation last week after an elections official reportedly observed ballots being altered.

"At this point, it is unclear how many ballots the employee at issue had access to, or what will be done with those ballots," the sheriff's office said on Monday.

At a Monday emergency meeting, officials in Clackamas County announced that the altered ballots would not be counted. Since ballots were anonymous, disenfranchised voters would not be given a chance to re-cast their votes.

Swenson has worked in elections since at least 2000, according to the Clackamas County spokesperson.

Blue Oregon's Kari Chisholm reported that the Oregon City woman's Facebook page indicated she "liked" various conservative personalities, candidates and organizations including the Republican National Committee, The Tea Party, Paul Ryan VP, the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC), Ann Romney and Fox News.

If convicted of a Class C felony for ballot tampering, Swenson could face five years in prison and a fine of up to $125,000.

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From this Friday's The Young Turks -- It’s no accident that Republicans hired firm being investigated for voter fraud :

Cenk has been covering the issue of voter fraud all year, and we’ve shown one example after another about how rare it actually is. Except, it turns out, for a company hired by the Republican National Committee to work in seven swing states.

“It’s not like this is a one-time accident, like, oops, golly gee, we just happened to hire a guy who happened to do something wrong,” Cenk says. “No, they hire him to do something wrong.”

Karoli already broke down a good deal of this story for C&L here, much of which Cenk touched on in the segment above -- Stupid GOP Voter Registration Tricks Continue in Swing States.

Thankfully this story is making its way into the national news, as we saw with some of Michael Isikoff's reporting, which he discussed with Chuck Todd this Friday -- RNC Cuts Off Firm in Wake of Voter Registration Fraud Allegations.

And for anyone trying to follow this story, the most comprehensive reporting has been from Brad Friedman, who you can follow on Twitter here. And you can read all of his reporting at his blog here -- The Brad Blog.

Here are his latest on this scandal:

VIDEO: My Appearance Breaking the News About the Nationwide GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal on Thom Hartmann TV Thursday Night

NC GOP Joins FL in Firing RNC's Romney-Tied Voter Registration Firm Accused of Fraud

KPFK 'BradCast': Palm Beach Election Supervisor Says FL Sec. of State Yet to Return Call About GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal

FL GOP FIRES ROMNEY CONSULTANT'S VOTER REGISTRATION FIRM AFTER FRAUDULENT FORMS REPORTED IN PALM BEACH COUNTY

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A voting expert from a nonpartisan think tank on Thursday deflated the hype that new voter restrictions are necessary when he told Fox News that voter fraud was as rare as "winning the lottery."

Brookings Institution nonresident fellow Michael McDonald explained to Fox News host Shepard Smith that the instances of in-person voter fraud were "very low."

"We've had millions and millions of voters over the last years and the likelihood of vote fraud occurring is on the order of winning the lottery," McDonald said.

"Winning the lottery is like 11 billion [to one]," Smith noted.

"Yes," McDonald agreed. "It's a very rare, infrequent sort of thing. But when it does happen, we are concerned. And election officials do take these allegations seriously, they investigate them fully. Usually what happens is, the allegations come out and then afterwards we find out that maybe someone signed on the wrong line on a poll book or something of that nature, and that's the source of the error. It wasn't really that vote fraud occurred."

Fox News has traditionally played a central role in promoting laws that often disenfranchise older and minority voters who tend to vote Democratic. They have set up a voter fraud email hotline and aired a "Stealing Your Vote" special report earlier this year that declared, "Voter fraud is still rampant."

The network recently hosted conservative columnist John Fund to defend Pennsylvania's voter photo ID law.

"To deny that voter fraud isn't going on is to frankly deny reality," Fund insisted.

A study by the Brennan Center for Justice warned last year that voting restrictions passed by Republican lawmakers could suppress as many as 5 million votes in 2012.

(h/t: Media Matters)

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Jon Stewart took a shot at Fox News, Republicans and their allies for not even trying to hide why they're passing these voter ID laws across the country, even though they're well aware that there is no problem with voter fraud.

As Stewart pointed out, they could care less about problems with absentee voting, which is one area where there are actually problems and John Fund just admitted why they're pushing these laws but don't care about problems with absentee voting: John Fund: Sure, Republicans Focus On Voter ID For Political Reasons:

John Fund, the former Wall Street Journal columnist who has been promoting voter ID laws for years, admitted Tuesday that some Republicans focus on voter ID laws which restrict in-person voting over laws which could limit absentee voting because the GOP has a perceived electoral advantage when it comes to voting by mail.

“Absentee vote ballot fraud is the tool of choice amongst fraudsters,” Fund told a group of bloggers munching on Chick-Fil-A at the conservative Heritage Foundation on Tuesday. “Everytime you see a truly massive, coordinated effort at voter fraud, it usually relies in part on absentee voter fraud.”

Fund said that many voter ID laws “take some provisions to curb absentee ballot fraud,” with a few exceptions. But he confessed that Democrats had a point when they say that Republicans focus on voter ID because of a potential electoral advantage.

“I think it is a fair argument of some liberals that there are some people who emphasize the voter ID part more than the absentee ballot part because supposedly Republicans like absentee ballots more and they don’t want to restrict that,” Fund said. “But the bottom line is, on good government grounds, we have to have both voter ID laws and absentee ballot laws.”

And as we posted here, Pennsylvania Rep. Mike Turzai openly admitted their new law will help Mitt Romney win their state in the upcoming presidential election: Shameless Republican Brags About Voter ID 'Winning the State of PA'. Stewart wondered if Turzai realized anyone had the camera running during that event, because Turzai was "going to look like an a**hole." I don't think they care too much as long as it means they win elections by hook or crook and stay in power.

Stewart then turned to his "Senior Voting Correspondent" Jessica Williams for further discussion on how these new regulations are going after minorities, the poor, students and the elderly and some potential new tests for eligibility to vote, like whether you understand Jeff Foxworthy jokes or not.

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A Republican candidate for supervisor in Pinal County, Arizona has with withdrawn following allegations that his former companion continued to cast absentee ballots five years after her death.

In a statement issued by his attorneys, John Enright said he was quitting "for several reasons, including an almost year-long battle with cancer," but did not address the voter fraud allegations, according the The Arizona Republic.

Several weeks ago, the Pinal County Recorder's Office received an anonymous letter that claimed that absentee ballots had been cast by Sheila Nassar as late as this this year, even though she had died on Feb. 3, 2007. Enright had lived with with Nassar until the time of her death.

In a YouTube video released on Saturday, Enright's new wife, Sharon Keiser, sits beside him while he explains that he was "surprised" to learn of the voter fraud allegations surrounding Nassar, who he called his "life companion" and former high school girlfriend.

"What I can say is I look forward to learning more about these allegations," the then-candidate insists in the video. "If they are indeed formal allegations, I will defend myself. I very much look forward to clearing my name."

A U.S. appeals court said earlier this year that the state could demand that voters show a photo ID before casting their ballots.

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Any time someone has to use James O'Keefe and one of his phoney sting videos to validate their argument, they don't have one, which is exactly what Heritage Foundation flack Brian Darling did this Monday to justify the GOP's voter suppression laws they've been passing across the country: Heritage Foundation ‘Expert’ Cannot Cite Any Examples Of Actual Voter Fraud:

In an interview with Chuck Todd on MSNBC’s The Daily Rundown this morning, Heritage Foundation senior fellow Brian Darling argued for the importance of Florida-style voter suppression laws in order to stop potential voter fraud. But when pressed by Todd to identify any actual examples of voter fraud, Darling appeared stumped:

DARLING: And there’ve been examples of voter fraud… in Florida. Look at ACORN.

TODD: Where is this voter fraud? I mean it is not this giant…

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Fox News host Gretchen Carlson says she can't understand why Democrats would be against discriminatory voter ID laws unless they are "for voter fraud."

Earlier this week, the Department of Justice blocked a law requiring Texas voters to show identification on the grounds that it could disenfranchise Latino voters.

Similar Republican-backed laws have also been blocked or temporarily barred in South Carolina and Wisconsin.

On Tuesday, Attorney General Eric Holder told NBC News that the laws only hindered voters because there was "no proof that our elections are marred by in-person voter fraud."

Fox News contributor Dick Morris said Wednesday that Holder's comments just amounted to election-year politics.

"What he's trying to do, of course politically, is to send a message to downscale voters, particularly to Latinos that the Republicans are against them and he's for them," Morris asserted. "The fact is that what Texas is doing is for free issuing this ID to people. Anyone who wants it can get it. And given that, for him to say that this inhibits participation in the franchise is ludicrous."

Ignoring Holder's point about there being no widespread voter fraud, Carlson said she could not imagine why anyone would be against voter ID laws.

"I just don't understand who is for voter fraud?" she asked. "Like, who is going to stand up and say, 'Yeah, I'm for voter fraud'? All this does is try to cut down on that."

A study released last year by the Brennan Center for Justice determined that the new restrictions on who can vote -- largely championed by Republican lawmakers -- could suppress the the votes of more than five million young, minority, low-income, and disabled voters, all groups who tend to vote for Democrats.

New photo ID restrictions in Kansas, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Wisconsin could disenfranchise up to 3.2 million voters, the report found. Another 2.6 million voters could be suppressed by proof of citizenship laws, laws restricting voter registration drives, election day registration restrictions, reduced early voting and restrictions on when convicted felons may have their voting rights restored.

The motivations of the Republicans introducing these restrictions haven’t exactly been a secret.

Republican House Speaker in New Hampshire, Bill O’Brien, was caught on tape explaining why he wanted to disenfranchise young voters.

“The kids [are] coming out of the school and basically doing what I did when I was a kid: voting as a liberal,” he told a tea party group last year. “You know, that’s what kids do. They don’t have life experience and they just vote their feelings.”

(H/T: Media Matters)

Like every election year, right-wing media are undermining confidence in the election process through baseless voter fraud fear mongering.

From our friends at Media Matters -- The voter fraud & intimidation stories you won't hear about on Fox:

For the past several months, Fox News has hyped GOP accusations of voter fraud, no matter how little evidence exists to support them, and Bret Baier has promised that Fox will cover voter fraud allegations "in every show." But Fox has failed to report on, or has dismissed and distorted, numerous accusations of voter fraud or intimidation carried out by individuals linked to right-wing groups and politicians.

Much more there, so go read the rest.

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Rachel Maddow talks to former U.S. Attorney David Iglesias about the pressure put on him to go after ACORN for voter fraud allegations and how Karl Rove wanted to use the issue of voter fraud as a wedge issue to win elections. As Rachel notes sadly, that plan is still paying dividends with the Democrats being all too happy to cave into political pressure by the Republicans instead of standing up for ACORN.

MADDOW: We have previously reported on this show how corporate interests opposed to ACORN`s really successful efforts to raise the minimum wage targeted the group using Republican-allied P.R. firms that proudly specialized in demonizing their opposition.

But ACORN has not just been targeted by corporations who worry that ACORN`s advocacy for living-wage ordinances and an increased minimum wage will hurt their corporate bottom line. ACORN has also been the subject for years of a purely political smear campaign, a campaign engineered by Republicans who are threatened by ACORN`s work to register young and poor and minority voters.

The American voter is typically older and more wealthy than the typical American, and that tends to give the Republicans an electoral edge among voters as compared to the preferences of the populations at large. But ACORN`s registration drives have gone some distance to changing that. Over the past five years, ACORN registered close to 2 million voters. And, yes, the groups of people that ACORN typically registers tend to vote for Democrats.

Over the last few election cycles, fear of a younger, less wealthy, and, frankly, less white electorate led Republicans, especially in swing states, to go after ACORN aggressively, and, in fact, to try to gin up charges against them, to try to make their voter registration efforts in general seem suspect and perhaps to bring down the group entirely. And when I say "ginned up," I`m not exaggerating.

Do you remember the U.S. attorney scandal, the alleged fire ring of U.S. attorneys because of U.S. political considerations? Recall what that scandal was really about. In 2006, nine U.S. attorneys were fired, surprisingly and suddenly, by the Department of Justice under George W. Bush.

Former U.S. attorney David Iglesias -- one of those U.S. attorneys who lost his job despite positive job reviews -- maintains that his pink slip came after he resisted pressure from Republicans to pursue bogus voter registration cases involving ACORN. The pressure began as early as 2002 when Mr. Iglesias says in his book "In Justice," he received an e-mail from the Department of Justice in Washington, quote, "suggesting, in no uncertain terms" that U.S. attorneys "offer whatever assistance we could in investigating and prosecuting voter fraud cases."

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