Man indicted in phone jamming case will argue Administration approved election scheme

John Byrne
Published: Friday July 7, 2006

The fourth man indicted in a New Hampshire phone-jamming scheme -- in which Republican operatives jammed the phone lines of Democratic get-out-the-vote efforts in a 2002 Senate race -- will argue at trial that the Bush Administration and the national Republican Party gave their approval to the plan, according to a motion filed by his attorney Thursday.

Shaun Hansen, the former owner of the company that placed hang-up calls to jam Democratic phone lines, was indicted in March for conspiring to commit and aiding and abetting the commission of interstate telephone harassment relating to a scheme to thwart get out the vote efforts on Election Day, 2002.

His lawyer's motion signals that Hansen intends to argue that he was entrapped because the Administration allegedly told his superiors the calls were legal. The filing indicates, however, that Hansen does not have firsthand knowledge of Administration intervention.

Hansen’s lawyer offered an inside look of his defense strategy in yesterday's filing: his client will assert that he believed he was acting on behalf of the government and the Republican Party through his work with GOP Marketplace, the company which subcontracted the phone jamming efforts.

"Mr. Hansen may assert that the government, or an agent therof, actually induced the offenses with which Mr. Hansen is charged, and was not otherwise prediposed to commit," Hansen's lawyer Jeffrey Levin writes.

"Mr. Hansen may asserts [sic] the defense of "derivative entrapment" in which the government uses a private party as its agent," Levin adds.

Phone calls lead to White House

Phone records show hundreds of phone calls from the New Hampshire Republican Party and convicted phone jammer James Tobin to the White House Office of Political Affairs during the time the scheme was being planned and carried out.

The Republican National Committee, which shelled out millions to defend Tobin, has said it is "preposterous" to suggest the calls involved phone jamming.

According to AP, "The phone records show that most calls to the White House were from Tobin, who became President Bush's presidential campaign chairman for the New England region in 2004. Other calls from New Hampshire senatorial campaign offices to the White House could have been made by a number of people."

A liberal political action group, Senate Majority Project, also uncovered that GOP Marketplace, which subcontracted out the hang-up calls to Hansen’s Mylo Enterprises, was partly owned by Mississippi Governor and former RNC Chair Haley Barbour.

Repeated hang-up calls that jammed telephone lines at a Democratic get-out-the-vote center helped secure the victory of Sen. John Sununu (R-NH) over Democrat Jeanne Shaheen in November 2002, 51 to 46 percent.

NH phone jammer to argue Bush Admin approved plan

Blogged by JC on 07.08.06 @ 09:40 PM ET

NH Phone Jamming Leads to White House?
When will the Oversight Hearings Begin

Many of us came into election day 2002 confident Democrats would certainly hold if not expand their majority in the Senate. One of the key Senate races was New Hampshire, where a highly popular Democratic Governor -- Jeannie Shaheen -- was running for an open Senate seat in an increasingly Democratic state. One of the shocking losses that evening was Shaheen's loss to then Rep. Sununu.

Later we learned that a prime contributor to Shaheen's upset loss was that their get out the vote operations - the lifeblood of any election day operation -- were effectively stymied by a sophisticated phone jamming operations. Years later legal prosecutions followed, the RNC paid for millions of dollars in legal fees -- apparently out of the goodness of their hearts. We also learned of numerous calls from NH Republican operatives responsible for the illegal jamming to, surprise, surprise, the White House on election day. Finally yesterday, we learned one of the defendants has told us that yes indeed, the instructions to do the jamming came on high from the White House.  See the NH Union Leader Article.

So we have a case of outright election fraud, that goes to the heart of our electoral integrity and effected the control of the Senate, and now we learned the fraud may go directly to the White House or the RNC. If this fact pattern was evident during the Clinton Administration, we would be having multiple congressional hearings and investigations going on. Under the GOP Majority? We have a resounding zero, no oversight, no congressional investigation. I'm glad DOJ is doing their job, albeit slowly, but Democracy demands more accountability than this.