Latino Leaders Pledge Aid for Illegal Voters

About two dozen Latino leaders, representing a wide range of political philosophies, have organized to review allegations that noncitizens voted in the Nov. 5 election and said they will raise funds for any of them who are prosecuted for voting illegally.

“If wrong was done, if a violation of the electoral process was done, that should be dealt with,” said Alfredo Amezcua, a Santa Ana attorney who chairs the new group, Citizens for Democracy. “We are not condoning anyone committing violations, but we certainly are promoting civic participation.”

Amezcua and others in the group said they were concerned that reports of the illegal voting has prompted “Latino bashing” and may intimidate immigrants from becoming citizens and voting. “Our leadership is going to be united in protecting the integrity of Latino voting rights,” Amezcua said.

Nineteen people interviewed by The Times acknowledged that they registered to vote before becoming citizens at a swearing-in ceremony, and later cast ballots in a district that included the hotly contested race between Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove) and Democrat Loretta Sanchez.

All but one registered while taking citizenship classes at Hermandad Mexicana Nacional, a Latino advocacy group in Santa Ana.

Sanchez won by 984 votes and is due to be sworn in as the county’s first Latino representative on Tuesday. Dornan has contended the election was tainted by voter fraud and called for a recount. The recount found no evidence of widespread fraud.

However, the district attorney’s office is investigating allegations of voting by noncitizens as well as other irregularities.

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Amezcua said the ongoing charges, along with the well-publicized findings that noncitizens voted in the district, may have a “chilling effect” on potential new citizens and voters. “A person who is here 15 years finally becomes a citizen, and the next thing they know, somebody is knocking on their door,” he said. “How would you feel?”

The group includes attorneys, accountants and business people, Republicans and Democrats, members said.

“The main concern is to get the atmosphere back to where it was” before the reports of illegal voting surfaced, said Rueben Martinez, a bookstore owner and longtime community activist in Santa Ana who is part of the new group. “My concern is that people do not get disillusioned, that they don’t give up in wanting to become citizens and register.”

Amin David, whose heads a longtime community group, Los Amigos of Orange County, is also a member of the Citizens for Democracy.

“[We agreed] that the community is most important,” David said. “Personal agendas, likes and dislikes, have no place as we talk about building back from the destructive forces that have kind of hurt the community.”

Among other things, the group plans to reconsider how voter registration drives are conducted and see if more caution is needed in the future, said David. “We have undergone a shake-up, and now we have to look and see, are we moving too fast without checking that the back tires are too low?”

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Voting by a noncitizen is a felony, and could result in deportation. Richard Rogers, district director for the Immigration and Naturalization Service, said his office is cooperating with the district attorney’s investigation, and that he plans to look closely at each case for possible action.

“If they in fact did vote and they were sworn in after the election, that’s a violation of the law. I don’t want to speculate until I see a case, but that person could be subject to revocation [of citizenship] or action, or criminal prosecution,” he said.

Martinez, the bookstore owner, said a major concern of group members is that no one be deported as the result of the investigations.

“What I hear a lot of people talking about is that we should criticize the people who didn’t vote,” he said. “These people at least tried. They were happy to be citizens. They got excited. And maybe they jumped the gun a little bit. They just wanted to be part of America.”