“I speak Spanish very well and (the letter) was offensive,” she said. “And it was offesnive and intimidating to many voters who talked to our office.”

She also said the law seemed to by on Nguyen’s side — for better or worse.

“If you read the state and federal laws, it’s very difficult to get a conviction. The laws are vague,” she said.

That was my fabulous Congresswoman, Loretta Sanchez, speaking to OC Register reporter Martin Wisckol about Attorney General Jerry Brown’s decision NOT to pursue criminal charges against Tan Nguyen for intimidating over 14,000 LEGALLY registered voters. Now maybe it really is quite difficult to get a conviction for a charge like this, but it shouldn’t be impossible. Chris Prevatt took another look at state election law at The Liberal OC, and he arrived at quite an interesting conclusion.

Follow me after the flip to see the law for yourself, and decide whether Jerry Brown really wants to enforce the law here…

Here’s what Chris dug up at The Liberal OC:

18540.  (a) Every person who makes use of or threatens to make use of any force, violence, or tactic of coercion or intimidation, to
induce or compel any other person to vote or refrain from voting at
any election or to vote or refrain from voting for any particular
person or measure at any election, or because any person voted or
refrained from voting at any election or voted or refrained from
voting for any particular person or measure at any election is guilty
of a felony punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for 16
months or two or three years.

  (b) Every person who hires or arranges for any other person to
make use of or threaten to make use of any force, violence, or tactic
of coercion or intimidation, to induce or compel any other person to
vote or refrain from voting at any election or to vote or refrain
from voting for any particular person or measure at any election, or
because any person voted or refrained from voting at any election or
voted or refrained from voting for any particular person or measure
at any election is guilty of a felony punishable by imprisonment in
the state prison for 16 months or two or three years.

18543.  (a) Every person who knowingly challenges a person’s right
to vote without probable cause or on fraudulent or spurious grounds,
or who engages in mass, indiscriminate, and groundless challenging of
voters solely for the purpose of preventing voters from voting or to
delay the process of voting, or who fraudulently advises any person
that he or she is not eligible to vote or is not registered to vote
when in fact that person is eligible or is registered, or who
violates Section 14240, is punishable by imprisonment in the county
jail for not more than 12 months or in the state prison.

  (b) Every person who conspires to violate subdivision (a) is
guilty of a felony.

OK, the law seems quite clear. This letter clearly violates state law. So why didn’t Jerry Brown take this case to court, and at least try to achieve justice for all the voters in Orange County who were nearly scared away from the polls by Tan Nguyen?

I have to concur with Chris here:

We all know that the letters went to 14,000 legally registered voters.  As registered voters these individuals are entitled to the right to vote, without intimidation or obstruction by anyone.  The only way a voter may be challenged is if an  elections official has specific and compelling evidence that the voter is not eligible to vote.  Elections officials are the only people who may directly intervene to stop someone from voting illegally.

I’ve got ju[s]t one question for AG Moon Beam and his Senior Assistan[t] AG in San Diego; How on earth can you conclude that section 18543 was not violated when eligible voters were challeneged without probable cause, by a mass and indiscriminate mailing to legally registered voters?  I cannot find anything in the code that talks about “intent.”  It is that act of intimidation that is the crime.  From what I can see, intent is nothing more than icing on the cake.

I just don’t get their reasoning here.

Neither do I, Chris. Neither do I.

“The right to vote is fully protected under the XV Amendment of the US constitution. Anybody that uses any intimidation tactics should be prosecuted with the full power of the law. When Mr. Nguyen or anybody else uses the printing materials such as letterhead of an anti-immigrant organization it shows intent to intimidate. How more clear can it be? I feel disappointed that it was LULAC that had to call the State Attorney General’s office to find out the results of the investigations rather than the AG call us. When I spoke with Mr. Schons he said that the case was closed back in February, they really dropped the ball. We are going to ask the US Attorney General to fully investigate this issue.”

That was Orange County LULAC President Benny Diaz, speaking to The Liberal OC about how he found out that Jerry Brown would not be pursuing a case against Tan Nguyen for illegally intimidating over 14,000 legal voters. So why didn’t Jerry Brown follow through on the case that Bill Lockyer was trying to make? And what do the people in Orange County who had the misfortune of having front-row seats to the Tan Nguyen debacle have to say about what happened yesterday?

Follow me after the flip for more…

Here are a couple more comments from The Liberal OC on Tan Nguyen and Jerry Brown’s decision not to prosecute him t the fullest extent of state law:

While Tan Nguyen is clearly not out of the woods yet, given the federal voting rights investigation that is still ongoing, he has clearly gotten a pass from Attorney General Moon Beam.

Frank Barbaro, Chairman of the Democratic Party of Orange County commented tonight saying;

“This is a classic case of wrong without remedy. Everybody agrees that what Tan Nguyen did was very wrong, and was done with the intent to discourage people from voting.”

Democratic Party of Orange County Vice-Chair Rima Nashashibi, who is an American-Palestinian born in Jerusalem, was a bit more blunt;

“The letters were offensive, to me and they were offensive to the legally registered voters who received them. At the time Tan Nguyen’s involvement in this attack on the voting rights of U.S. citizens was revealed, both Democrat and Republican leaders condemned his actions. Despite the decision of the State Attorney General on this matter, I hope GOP Chairman Scott Baugh will continue to stand by his repudiation of Tan Nguyen’s acts of voter intimidation.”

Tan Nguyen has never apologized for his actions and he needs to be held accountable. Hopefully, this will occur at the federal level. Only time will tell. Tick-tock, tick-tock.

Yes, Tan Nguyen should be held accountable for sending this letter to over 14,000 legally registered voters in Central Orange County. So why didn’t Jerry Brown do that? Why didn’t he pursue a case against Tan Nguyen? Why didn’t he stand up for Californians’ right to vote… And NOT be intimidated away from doing so?

I really don;t like speculating about these matters. That’s why I’d like an answer from our Attorney General. Why didn’t he do his job of prosecuting those (like Tan Nguyen) who commit crimes against innocent people (like scaring them away from the polls)? Why, Jerry? Why?

Here’s a new angle to being “soft on crime”… Why didn’t Attorney General Jerry Brown file suit against Tan Nguyen for intimidating legal Latino voters? Claudio Gallegos lets it rip at Orange Juice:

The California Attorney General’s office announced today that Tan Nguyen will not face charges in the fraudulent letter he sent out to disenfranchise Latino voters. Former Attorney General Bill Lockyer quickly moved into action to ensure Nguyen was held accountable. Unfortunately he did not have enough time in his term left. Democrat(although I am hesitant to call him that at this point) Jerry Brown took over as Attorney General. His spokesman Gary Schons is quoted as saying

“We had to prove that they intended to intimidate lawfully registered voters. We found no evidence that they intended to intimidate lawfully registered voters. In fact, the first line of the letter said, ‘If you’re a lawfully registered voter, we encourage you to vote.’ A lot of people missed that.”

No kidding a lot of people missed it Mr. Schons, it was meant to be missed. Even Republicans were calling for his head.

So is there something that Jerry Brown missed here? Follow me after the flip for more…

Here’s the rest of what Claudio has to say at Orange Juice:

If there was no criminal intent, please explain why Tan did the following actions:

1) Use a fake letterhead of an anti-immigrant organization instead of his own campaign letterhead?

2) Why did they use a fake name at the end of the letter?

3) Why was Tan refusing to answer the simplest of questions regarding this letter?

4) Why did Tan Nguyen’s story change about 10 times?

The intent was clear, to intimidate Latino voters and stay covert. Pure and simple. In the 2006 election I voted for the Green Party candidate for Attorney General because I felt Rocky Delgadillo should have been our nominee and dinosaurs like Jerry Brown need to move aside for our generation. Thanks for confirming I made the right vote. And I will continue to vote Green whenever Jerry Brown is on the ballot.

Tan Nguyen was the most obviously guilty man since OJ Simpson, yet he will walk away unpunished. Let this be a lesson to you all, include some obscure hidden sentence in a letter, intimidate and disenfranchise voters and you will not be held responsible for your actions. Thanks alot Jerry, I see your softness on crime extends to those who seek to disenfranchise minorities’ right to vote.

Well, it hurts me to say this… But perhaps, Claudio and blogswarm are right here. Jerry Brown really failed all of us in Orange County who were hoping for some real actions against the illegal voter intimidation antics used by Tan Nguyen in his despicable “campaign” against my fabulous Congresswoman, Loretta Sanchez. Now why he couldn’t he stand up for all of us voters in Orange County? And for that matter, why can’t he stand up for all the voters in this state who should NEVER be intimidated in the way that those 14,000+ legal voters were?

Maybe Jerry Brown shouldn’t have been our choice for Attorney General if he wasn’t really interested in doing his job.