CAVA, DA, PUT POLITIQUERAS, ABUSERS ON NOTICE

By Juan Montoya
The full force of the Cameron County District Attorney's Office will be applied toward the prosecution of those crooked politicians and their paid politiqueras(os) who seek to pack the ballots with paid mail-in votes and haul in the elderly to vote for them.
DA Luis Saenz told a crowd of perhaps 100 people who attended the Citizens Against Voter Abuse (CAVA) and IntelliVote voter education initiative last night at a TSC lecture hall that his office would prosecute vote abusers to the full extent of the law.
 Also participating in the event was the head of the DA's Public Integrity Unit and Chris Davis, head of the county Elections Department.
"I'm committed to working with Chris (Davis)...and I am committed to prosecuting anybody that is committing fraudulent voting...there are no sacred cows," he told a cheering crowd.
"Do you know that there have only been 28 applications at the county elections office of people who have applied to vote by mail?" Saenz said. "That's just amazing."
Sanez then went on to remind those present that in the last election where he garnered the DA's office, there had been rampant use and abuse of the mail-in ballots.
"I got something like 150 and my opponent got about 350, more than twice as I did," he said.
"We want to make sure that every vote is voluntarily submitted, that is, that no one tells you who to vote for, and that it is intelligently submitted," he said. "The right to vote is what our soldiers in Afghanistan are dying for. Exercising the right to vote is our way of showing them that we appreciate what they've done for us."
Davis outline the anti-voting fraud precautions that have been built into the voting process. He said that there are 104 voting precincts in the county and that he was asking the candidates present and the people they appoint as poll watchers to document what they believed was wrongdoing on the part of voters and precinct workers.
"Attest to it," he admonished them. "Put it on paper."
He spoke at length about the measures that will be in place to deter hauled-in elderly and infirm voters who are brought in vans to vote from the adult day-care centers around the county.
If a van filled with elderly are brought to a polling place, the precinct workers have been instructed to ask the driver to step aside while they question the voters. The workers will then inquire of the voters who among them are able to walk to the ballot boxes to vote on their own. They will then ask who among them can vote without assistance. Then they will ask who among them require assistance. The workers will provide assistant tho those who wish it, and only then, if the voter asks that the driver assist them, can they become involved.
A van which has people who ask to vote in there becomes a polling place on wheels and all the rules that apply to a fixed polling place go into effect, he said. That means that there can be no pre-marked ballots or propaganda for candidates inside the vans, he said. The details of how that will work is yet to be ironed out, he answered to a question  from the audience.
"There is no perfect system," Saenz told the audience in his comments. "Whatever Chris comes up with, the bad guys will think of a way to get around it."
However, he said that the fact that many had attended the meeting and were interested in stopping voting fraud only proved that progress had been made.
"You've heard of the saying that one person can make a difference," Saenz said. "(CAVA) director Mary Helen gives live to that expression. A year ago there was only one person and look at us now."