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WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2002

"A corrupt home-plate umpire can easily decide the outcome of any baseball game. A few corrupt translators can just as easily decide the outcome of South Dakota's Senate race (and perhaps control of the U.S. Senate), thanks to that state's Indian reservation voter-registration scandal.

Fact one: Many Indian languages lack written alphabets. This means their bilingual ballots are actually cast via oral translation. Fact two: Every aspect of the voter-verification process can be conducted via translation, if only the voter's "translator" makes such a request.

Given these two facts, all anyone needs to sway this year's South Dakota Senate race is a list of fraudulently registered Indian voters, a willingness to round up a few Indians and a bus to bring them to a polling place. The person with the registration list then claims to be translating for each person in the group and helps them cast their ballots for the candidate of his choice under the names registered earlier. . ."

Get the Story:
Jim Boulet Jr.: Lost in Translation (The National Review 10/22)

Related Stories:
All eyes on South Dakota for votes (10/22)
Charges of Indian voter fraud denied (10/18)
Editorial: Investigate voter fraud (10/18)
S.D. voter fraud probe continues (10/17)
'More and more' cases of voter fraud (10/16)
Thune: S.D. vote challenge not my idea (10/16)
Problems cited with Indian voter drive (10/15)
Native voters said key in S.D. races (09/02)