GOP Affiliate Accused of Duping Voters to Register as Republicans

The Los Angeles Times randomly contacted dozens of voters who were recently re-registered as Republicans and found that over 80 percent of them didn’t know they had joined the party’s ranks. How did this happen? Looks like a GOP contractor called Young Political Majors, or YPM, had something to do with it.

According to the Times, YPM deceived many voters, having them sign “what they believed were petitions for tougher penalties against child molesters”; actually they were adding their names to the YPM’s roster of new Republican recruits.

Update: The Brad Blog has more on the arrest of the head of the YPM.

Los Angeles Times:

It is a bait-and-switch scheme familiar to election experts. The firm hired by the California Republican Party — a small company called Young Political Majors, or YPM, which operates in several states — has been accused of using the tactic across the country.

Election officials and lawmakers have launched investigations into the activities of YPM workers in Florida and Massachusetts. In Arizona, the firm was recently a defendant in a civil rights lawsuit. Prosecutors in Los Angeles and Ventura counties say they are investigating complaints about the company.

The firm, which a Republican Party spokesman said is paid $7 to $12 for each registration it secures, has denied any wrongdoing and says it has never been charged with a crime.

The 70,000 voters YPM has registered for the Republican Party this year will help combat the public perception that it is struggling amid Democratic gains nationally, give a boost to fundraising efforts and bolster member support for party leaders, political strategists from both parties say.

Those who were formerly Democrats may stop receiving phone calls and literature from that party, perhaps affecting its get-out-the-vote efforts. They also will be given only a Republican ballot in the next primary election if they do not switch their registration back before then.

Some also report having their registration status changed to absentee without their permission; if they show up at the polls without a ballot they may be unable to vote.

The Times randomly interviewed 46 of the hundreds of voters whose election records show they were recently re-registered as Republicans by YPM, and 37 of them — more than 80% — said that they were misled into making the change or that it was done without their knowledge.

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