The RNC hired a firm that dabbles in voter registration fraud, for some reason.

As you might remember, the GOP swears up and down that voter fraud is destroying our great nation, and we must take action in order to stop it. They are so upset about this scourge that they are trying to pass laws all over the country, including here in Maine, to make it harder for people to vote. Maine GOP Chair Charlie Webster got so up in arms about this problem, which, it turns out, is more or less made up, he drew national attention to our state by insisting to burn this witch come Hell or high water.

And so if some Republicans hadn’t already been honest about their intentions—supposed “voter fraud” clean up efforts actually just benefit, you guessed it, Republicans—one might be surprised to learn that the Republican National Committee is in trouble for employing Strategic Allied Consulting due to the firm’s engagement in voter registration fraud.

The party touts the fact that they fired the firm because they have a “zero tolerance policy” about this kind of stuff. They did not, however, dwell on the fact that the firm is headed by Nathan Sproul, a known bad actor. In 2004, Sproul’s Voters Outreach of America pretended to be a voter registration group sympathetic to Democrats and destroyed their registration cards. Oops.

It should be noted, as Josh Marshal at TPM did so elegantly, that voter registration fraud is not nearly as diabolical as vote fraud is:

Vote fraud is what most of us think of: voting twice, voting when you’re not eligible to vote, stuffing ballot boxes with phony ballots and so forth. Voter registration fraud is registering people to vote who don’t exist or signing up legitimate voters without their signatures or permission and so forth.

This does not explain, however, why a party so rabid about the sanctity of the ballot box would hire Sproul with his bad record. Despite the fact that Sproul’s firm has been accused of in 2012 is far less problematic than what the party suggests happens all the time, and—again—what data shows pretty much never happens, we are left asking: “How come the GOP seems only to take action when it comes to creating legislation that suppresses votes and is favorable to them and their policies, but not when it comes to their hiring practices?”

And we are left with the inevitable and obvious answer: The GOP only cares about integrity when it helps their bottom line and could give a damn about anyone who has to get taken down because they are perceived to be standing in the party’s way.

IMAGE SOURCE: Doonesbury

Alex Steed

About Alex Steed

Alex Steed has written about and engaged in politics since he was an insufferable teenager. He has run for the Statehouse and produced a successful web series. He now runs a content firm called Knack Factory with two guys who are a lot more talented than himself.