Will we ever know who complained about Biskupic?

The Brawler realizes he's being a tad obsessive, but he must ask: Will we ever find out who complained to the Bush Administration that Steven M. Biskupic was not vigorously pursuing voter fraud cases?

It was 10 days since the AP reported this:

Dating back to mid-2004, the White House's legislative affairs, political affairs and chief of staff's office had received complaints from a variety of sources about the lack of vigorous prosecution of election fraud cases in various locations, including Philadelphia, Milwaukee and New Mexico, [a White House spokeswoman] said.

And yet we still don't know who these "sources" were in Milwaukee. We know who says they didn't do it. But we have no idea who did actually do it. And yes, it feels odd to the Brawler to take the White House at its word when Jessica McBride accuses them of misleading the public.

This matter was brought afresh to the Brawler's mind by a story by McClatchy news service:

WASHINGTON - Under President Bush, the Justice Department has backed laws that narrow minority voting rights and pressed U.S. attorneys to investigate voter fraud - policies that critics say have been intended to suppress Democratic votes.

Bush, his deputy chief of staff, Karl Rove, and other Republican political advisers have highlighted voting rights issues and what Rove has called the "growing problem" of election fraud by Democrats since Bush took power in the tumultuous election of 2000, a race ultimately decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.

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Last April, while the Justice Department and the White House were planning the firings, Rove gave a speech in Washington to the Republican National Lawyers Association. He ticked off 11 states that he said could be pivotal in the 2008 elections. Bush has appointed new U.S. attorneys in nine of them since 2005: Florida, Colorado, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Arkansas, Michigan, Nevada and New Mexico. U.S. attorneys in the latter four were among those fired.

The Brawler would suggest any voter fraud actions brought by Erik C. Peterson be viewed with extreme skepticism.

Deeper in the story we learn this -- and this definitely caught the Brawler's eye.

Rove talked about the Northwest region in his speech last spring to the Republican lawyers and voiced concern about the trend toward mail-in ballots and online voting. He also questioned the legitimacy of voter rolls in Philadelphia and Milwaukee.

One audience member asked Rove whether he'd "thought about using the bully pulpit of the White House to talk about election reform and an election integrity agenda that would put the Democrats back on the defensive."

"Yes, it's an interesting idea," Rove responded.

Note that Rove made these comments well after Biskupic said he found no evidence of any conspiracy in the 2004 election. But you can't expect Rove to let a good Repub talking point die, can you?

On a related note, Biskupic responded to Bruce Murphy's question about whether he was "amenable" to White House pressure:

Biskupic himself, in response to my column, responded as follows:

“1. As far as I recall, I have never been contacted by the White House about anything (except my nomination as U.S. attorney more than five years ago). I never knew until published reports this week that someone was complaining to the WH about lax prosecution on voter fraud.

2. The local Republican Party did make public complaints to my office about voter fraud in Milwaukee, including a letter with specific allegations. You may recall we investigated and publicly rejected the specific allegations.

3. No one (beyond normal lawyer stuff such as a lawyer advocating for a particular client) contacted me to encourage or discourage the prosecution of the other public corruption cases. There definitely was no political pressure to pursue or not pursue a specific case.”

Fair enough. The Brawler has no reason to doubt Biskupic.

But who complained? The Brawler has his own theory, albeit unsubstantiated. My advice to the Journal Sentinel: Spend some time on this. Some local Republicans have been complaining to the White House about alleged voter fraud. The White House, a champion of voter suppression, has cited Milwaukee as a target of interest. Some might construe that as an interesting story.

Spend some time on this. I know you run lean, so just run wire copy about Tommy Thompson's presidential bid!