BITTER ENDERS:

Lawyers: Did Tim Johnson win fairly?: Some in GOP say their efforts could improve voting process (David Kranz, 12/8/2002, Sioux City Argus Leader)

South Dakota's protracted Senate race publicly ended more than a month ago.

But the contentious bickering that marked the yearlong campaign between Democratic Sen. Tim Johnson and Republican Rep. John Thune didn't stop the morning after Nov. 5.

A small group of Republican lawyers, suspecting that Democrats unduly influenced the election in Native American precincts such as Parmalee and Pine Ridge, have scoured Indian Country for misdeeds.

The lawyers - the most active of which received training on voter fraud at a GOP seminar last summer in Texas - have interviewed dozens of voters and poll watchers who say they were involved in or witnessed irregularities on or near the reservations.

Those interviews are compiled in 50 affidavits that in recent days have been the foundation of reports among conservative media, cable television talk shows and a nearly constant Internet drumbeat that suggests Democrat-inspired impropriety was behind Johnson's narrow win over Thune.

The one good thing that could come of pursuing these things is that it might have some deterrent effect in the future...but one doubts it.
Posted by Orrin Judd at December 9, 2002 9:03 AM