Passing the Buck in Ballot Probe : House’s Sanchez inquiry should not rely on Jones’ data

The House of Representatives should not have passed the buck by asking California Secretary of State Bill Jones to do its work and determine if Rep. Loretta Sanchez (D-Garden Grove) should be seated in Congress.

Jones has his own investigation going, seeking to determine how many votes were cast last year in Orange County by ineligible voters. Congress was conducting a similar probe as part of its job to determine who is qualified to be a member. But rather than merely asking Jones to double-check its lists of possible fraudulent voters, the House has decided to use whatever Jones and the Immigration and Naturalization Service come up with as definitive.

The House Oversight Committee has spent long enough on this matter to make its own decision. Leaving it to Jones will only delay matters. If the House hasn’t found enough evidence to overturn the election results, it should say so.

Although Republicans on the committee said they wanted to take politics out of the investigation, the fact is Jones is a Republican, elected to a partisan office. No one disputes his competence, and he did certify Sanchez’s election results after the balloting a year ago, but his party membership is a complication.

Sanchez defeated the longtime incumbent, Robert K. Dornan, by only 984 votes last year. Investigations by Jones and Orange County Dist. Atty. Michael R. Capizzi have produced evidence that an as yet undetermined number of people cast ballots although they were ineligible to register or vote because they were not American citizens.

Jones said last month that he has found evidence that more than 5,000 people who were registered to vote in Orange County in November 1996 may not have been citizens. He said perhaps 3,000 of those voted. It is illegal for noncitizens to register to vote, or to vote. But it has not been determined how many ineligible voters live in Sanchez’s 46th district, if any, and how many voted for Sanchez, not Dornan.

The House was wrong to duck its responsibility, but Jones is right to seek ways to stop fraudulent voting. His investigation should continue in order to paint a true picture of how many wrongful votes were cast. Also, the INS has to shape up and produce data that will be meaningful.