Did Armed GOP Thugs Try to Keep Libertarian Party off Illinois Ballot?

File this under incredibly
creepy. The Chicago Sun-Times is reporting the private detectives
hired by the Illinois Republican Party have been intimidating
people gathering signatures to get the Libertarian Party on the
state ballot for November. Check it out, from
columnist Dan
Mihalopouls:

A couple of months after Julieus Hooks signed [the Libertarian
Party’s] nominating petitions, a man with a gun walked up to Hooks
as he left his home in Oak Park.

The man said he was a private investigator. He told Hooks the
petition that he had signed was fraudulent and asked him to sign
something. Hooks hastily agreed to sign the paper.

“I did not have time to fully review this document because the
man with the gun instructed me to sign it, and I was afraid of him
and what he may do to me if I refused,” Hooks says….

Hooks had signed a petition for the Libertarians in May. He
recanted his story in the affidavit that the man with the gun got
him to sign. But then Hooks swore a second affidavit saying he did
not mean what he said in the affidavit for the armed man.

According to the most recent version of his story, Hooks said,
“On or about July 20, 2014, I was exiting my house when a tall
Caucasian man and a woman approached and startled me. The man had a
gun, which was visible. They told me that the woman who had
circulated the petition sheet that I had signed had violated the
law because she had obtained too many signatures and committed
fraud. I was then given a piece of paper and told to sign.”

Sarah Dart, who was paid to circulate petitions for the
Libertarians and obtained Hooks’ signature, told me a similar
story. Dart says a private investigator named Carlos Rodriguez
contacted her, asking about a missing girl who knew someone she
supposedly knew.

She believes the story about the missing girl was a ruse. When
she met with Rodriguez, Dart says he confronted her with a stack of
petitions and asked her to admit that the signatures for the
Libertarians were obtained fraudulently. She refused, and the
state’s hearing officer later found that her signatures were
legitimately gathered.

Dart says Rodriguez displayed a holstered gun when he met her.
He gave her a business card showing he works for Morrison Security
in Alsip. The company’s owner is the Palos Township Republican
leader, Sean Morrison.

More here.

The Sun-Times

also reports that:

Bruce Rauner’s spokesman says the Republican nominee for
governor knew nothing about the unusual strong-arm tactics used by
his allies in their failed effort to keep the Libertarian Party
candidates from appearing on the November ballot.

The statement from Rauner’s campaign followed my column last
week on the Republican deployment of armed private investigators to
challenge the Libertarian slate’s nominating signature
petitions.

“Bruce wants as many people engaged in the political process as
possible,” Rauner spokesman Mike Schrimpf said in an e-mail. “Bruce
has no knowledge of these alleged activities, and if they are true,
he strongly denounces them. Bruce doesn’t agree with any form of
voter intimidation.”

As of now, the state election board has ruled the LP has
gathered enough valid signatures to be on the ballot in the fall,
where the Libertarian is expected to take votes away from the
Republican candidate Rauner.

The story isn’t over yet, though: the Illinois LP has filed
criminal
complaints with the state attorney general the Cook County
state attorney over the alleged intimidation. Here’s hoping
the whole story comes out and is dealt with quickly, publicly, and
fairly.

Hat tip: John
Avlon.