Election Year Antics

California State Attorney General Bill Lockyer has launched what he calls an “aggressive” investigation into a mysterious mailer sent to Latino voters in Orange County, California warning them it’s illegal for immigrants to vote. The mailer – sent on letterhead from the California Coalition for Immigration Reform – warns voters in Spanish that those who do vote could end up in jail. It also says federal officials are keeping a searchable database – available to anti-illegal immigration groups – that tracks people casting votes. “It’s clear intimidation,” said John Trasvina, interim president and general counsel for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund. “It’s targeted to foreign-born voters, as opposed to newly registered.”  Click here and here for news stories on the mailer.

The site of a great increase in the Latino/a population in the last twenty years, Orange County allso has been the site of a good deal of anti-immigrant activity. Minuteman founder Jim Gilchrist unsuccessfully ran for Congress in the OC.

Thanks to UC Davis law alum Che Salinas for this story!

KJ