Chris Norby and the Dark Side

Yesterday the Orange County Board of Supervisors, in a 4-1 partisan Republican vote decided to do nothing more than pass a sham resolution in response to the apparent attempt by Republican Congressional candidate Tan Nguyen to suppress Latino voting in central Orange County.

Despite offers by two affected candidates (Daucher & Correa running for State Senate) and the Orange County Employees Association to cover the costs of a corrective mailer from the Registrar of Voters, the Republican Board majority decided to do nothing to protect the integrity of the vote in central OC. These guys had their trumped up reasons of course. First it was the cost and when that issue became moot they claimed that it wasn’t the place of the Registrar of Voters to respond to false campaign mailings.

Someone named “Publius” posted on our blog yesterday:

“It is the duty of the County Elections officer (Registrar of Voters) to provide an impediment-free environment that encourages all eligible citizens to cast a ballot.”

Tan Nguyen’s fraudulent and misleading mailing was much more than a false campaign mailing. It was a direct and deliberate attempt to impede the free environment that encourages all citizens to cast a ballot on Election Day. The Board of Supervisors is responsible for ensuring that Registrar of Voters Neal Kelley carries out his responsibilities in a non-partisan manner.

Rather than carry out that duty, the Board directly acted in a partisan, and from my perspective a possibly racist, way to stop Registrar Neal Kelley from doing his job. If a Democrat had sent Tan Nguyen’s letter to Republican voters, they would be all over correcting the record. But because the letter targeted Democrat, minority, Latino, immigrant voters it is apparently none of the County’s business to respond and passed it off to the Republican Secretary of State.

I’ve got to ask why did these guys not want to handle the matter here in OC?

I cannot speak to the possibility of motivations other than partisan, on the part of Supervisors Campbell, Silva, and Wilson. However, I can speak to evidence of racist, or at least anti-Latino, motivations on the part of Supervisor Chris Norby.

Attorney H. Bryan Card pointed me in the direction of the sexual harassment case of Pamela Mokler against Chris Norby from 2005. In a sworn testimony on March 7, 2005 Ms. Mokler claimed that Supervisor Norby had said to her on one occasion when she was discussing outreach programs targeting Latino seniors “Why the f##k do you have to do something special for Mexicans?

In testimony under oath, Norby admitted to the “Mexicans” statement but denied dropping the F-Bomb.

So I am not surprised by Chris Norby’s desire to ignore voter suppression directed at Latinos? It is part of his overall pattern of behavior, and his very nature. Supervisor Norby has consistently opposed outreach to minority communities, and his actions, or in this case inaction, is just more of the same. Chris Norby is just another poster boy, along with Tan Nguyen, Assemblyman Chuck Devore, Councilman Bob Hernandez, former State Republican Chairman Shawn Steel, and others for the Dark Side of the Republican Party of Orange County.

Most Republicans I know personally are not right-wing- nut job racists. Unfortunately, Republicans in TheOC keep electing these people as leaders in their party.

As the saying goes…

You can tell a lot about a person’s character by the company they keep.

Supervisor Norby, you should be ashamed of yourself. Supervisors Campbell, Wilson and Silva, you have no excuse for your actions and should be equally ashamed.

For my part, I am embarrassed for my county that the four of you represent the majority view on our County Board of Supervisors.