James Tobin's Calls to the White House

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James Tobin's Calls to the White House

By Paul Kiel - March 23, 2006, 6:30 PM

James Tobin, the RNC's regional political director in 2002, was convicted for his part in orchestrating a scheme to jam Democrats' phone lines on Election Day, 2002. Turns out he was in more or less constant contact with the White House Office of Political Affairs through much of that day. You figure the phone jamming effort ever came up in their many conversations?

Tobin's and his fellow conspirators' phone records were introduced as evidence at his trial, and for a long time, the Senate Majority Project has been busily analyzing them to figure out just who Tobin was speaking to.

They're not done yet. But here's what we can tell you from their preliminary analysis. Tobin called the White House Office of Political Affairs, which was run by now-RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman, more than 75 times from Sept. 30 to Nov. 22 of 2002. That much was reported today in New Hampshire's Union Leader. You can see the analysis that was based on here. He was also in touch with the White House on the day the phone-jamming was taking place.

First, a bit of backstory to catch everyone up. Chuck McGee, the Executive Director of the New Hampshire Republican Party, hatched the plan in October of 2002 and brought in http://talkingpointsmemo.com/grandolddocket.php#Tobin">Tobin for help in carrying it out. Tobin brought in Allen Raymond of GOP Marketplace, who arranged for an Idaho call center to call Democratic phone lines and hang up repeatedly from 7:45 AM until 9:10 AM.

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