Witnesses claim Somali polling place translator was telling people to vote for Coleman
Tuesday, November 04, 2008 at 2:38 pm
- 19 Comments
Mahamoud Wardere (in red shirt) talks to voter
Earlier today, three voters of Somali origin at the Brian Coyle Center in Minneapolis told me — and two told an election observer — that a translator working there may have interfered with voters.
In addition, the presence of a staffer from Norm Coleman’s office who says he came to volunteer his services as a GOP challenger or translator also stirred controversy between election judges and challengers.
The tussles started this morning around 10:30, when three white male Republican vote challengers arrived at the Brian Coyle Community Center in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood of Minneapolis claiming that they had received a phone call indicating that Somali translators there were telling area residents to vote for Democrats.
One of the challengers confronted an election judge with the claim. The Somali community had about eight translators there assisting. The election judge assured that translators were only there to provide language assistance.
Two Republican challengers monitoring voters at Brian Coyle Center
The men then called in a GOP-affiliated Somali translator. According to eyewitnesses, he is well-known in the Somali community because he works at Sen. Norm Coleman’s office. The man initially refused to give me his name, but later conceded that he is Mahamoud Wardere, a staffer in Norm Coleman’s US Senate office.
At about the time of his arrival, a few of the community translators were confronted by the remaining white GOP challenger. He asked one woman, who was a volunteer, if she had been sworn in. (Translators do not need to be sworn in.) At another point he told the election judge that the translators could not be at the voting booths “hovering around.” He also confronted some other translators directly, but refused to let me hear what he was saying. Some of the translators left, one person told me of feeling “intimidated.” Yet Wardere admitted to me that he never heard anyone telling voters how to vote, and was unsure why the GOP challenger was confronting the translators.
Wardere, who hung around and talked to voters inside, was eventually asked to leave the voting area, since he was not allowed to serve as both an election challenger and a translator — for his own part, Wardere initially said he was uncertain whether he was called in as a challenger or a translator — nor could there be more than one GOP challenger in the room.
But the Coleman staffer did not leave the premises. From around 11:00 onward, Wardere sat in a nearby room, greeting and conversing with people. “People know him and like him,” one person told me. “But we all know him as a campaigner.”
As the day progressed, more confusion ensued about voter laws and Wardere’s role in the polling place. Three eyewitnesses told me that a translator told them to vote for Norm Coleman, though those individuals declined to give their names or point out the specific translator. One man said he was afraid to give his name because he didn’t want people to get mad at him, but added that “it is just not right.”
[UPDATED: This paragraph and the quoted passage below contains a modified version of the source's claims.] A polling observer from Election Protection, a non-partisan group working polling places, also told me of complaints that two people had made to her. To quote from an email she sent to correct my original characterization:
What two people told me, and what I relayed to Ms. Priesmeyer three separate times, was that a woman in red headdress appeared to be approaching only elderly, non-English speaking voters and offering them translation services. They said that the woman in red headdress was physically filling out the ballot, rather than allowing the elderly voter to do so, and making selections contrary to the elderly voter’s intent. One of the people who approached me said that in one instance she witnessed an elderly voter indicate that she wanted to vote for Al Franken, and the woman in red headdress selected Norm Coleman instead. She also pointed out the gentleman identified in the article as Mr. Wardere and identified him as someone who works in Norm Coleman’s campaign office (as did many others). She said he had been hanging around the polling place (a gymnasium) and then in a separate room to the left of the polling place throughout the day. She said that he had been approaching and talking to others who were coming to vote.
I did not observe, nor was I told, nor did I state to Ms. Priesmeyer or anyone else that a woman in red headdress was bringing elderly voters to the man identified in the article as Mr. Wardere (or to anyone else, for that matter).
The election judge, Margie Sanronman, said she has never seen things so ugly. She’s served as a volunteer judge for the precinct for 10 years. “It’s been disruptive all day,” she said. “We’ve had a disruptive challenger. People fighting with each other. They’ve been complaining about people all day.”
The disruptive challenger she spoke of was the GOP challenger, who declined to speak to me.
For more on the story, read Nekessa Opoti’s account from the Twin Cities Daily Planet.
Below: A 2006 press release that details Wardere’s role in Norm Coleman’s campaign, and a video interview by the UpTake of a volunteer translator who was “challenged” by the GOP challenger on site.
| COLEMAN ANNOUNCES $106,971 GRANT FOR THE CONFEDERATION OF SOMALI COMMUNITY IN MINNESOTA Ethnic Community Self-Help grant will help fund the East African Women’s Center |
| August 3rd, 2006 – St. Paul, MN – Senator Coleman announced today the Confederation of Somali Community in Minnesota (CSCM) will receive a $106,971 Ethnic Community Self-Help grant from the United States Office of Refugee Resettlement. The grant will support the work of the East African Women’s Center in contextual language learning, school readiness and parenting in America, the Woman to Woman Connection (a support network to bridge cultures), navigation of the social service and healthcare systems, and a textile cooperative.
“I am pleased to announce CSCM will receive this grant,” said Coleman. “Minnesota has the largest Somali population in the country, and I have pledged to offer my support for them in Congress. CSCM does fantastic work on behalf of the local Somali community. I was pleased to assist them in obtaining this grant and I applaud the U.S. Office of Refugee Resettlement for recognizing the importance of CSCM.” “I feel great. We are happy to receive the grant,” said Saeed Fahia, Executive Director of the CSCM. “It will help the Somali women to integrate into the state of Minnesota. Senator Coleman helped secure this grant for us and we appreciate it.” Senator Coleman has worked closely with the Somali community while in the Senate, having most recently secured the extension of Temporary Protected Status for certain Somalis living in the United States. Coleman also has a Somali immigrant, Mahamoud Wardere, on his staff to help facilitate and increase his outreach to the Somali community. ###
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19 Comments
Comment posted November 4, 2008 @ 4:17 pm
If these people were helping Somalis speak or communicate, they are interpreters, not translators. Translators translate written words. The crux of the story doesn’t surprise me, why would it?
Comment posted November 4, 2008 @ 4:18 pm
This is the last straw coleman, I am going to see all your crimes exposed.
Please drop in as I reveal every detail of this man’s crooked and sordid tale of a public servant run amok.
I will not rest until I uncover everything about you and expose you as the criminal you are and you are safely behind bars.
Comment posted November 4, 2008 @ 8:28 pm
Not only is this shameful behavior by the GOP..AGAIN! but how moronic. This area will go for Obama and probably Franken anyhow.. so why would they even try to punk the Somali community ?
oh yea, that’s right.. the the GOP’s are full of Morons
Comment posted November 5, 2008 @ 12:13 am
Hey Jmy9595,
um the Ballot in Minnesota is printed, so yes, it is full of written words. And they are translated for the voters. hence, yes translator is correct. Were you there today perhaps this morning? in your nice clean suit?
Comment posted November 5, 2008 @ 7:26 am
If Coleman wins we will just go through the painful removal of him from office when the Texas Lawsuit comes to town.
The first move by the new Congress should be to bring ethics charges against Ted Stevens and his buddy Coleman and send these cheats home.
Comment posted November 5, 2008 @ 10:59 am
Where was the Chair Judge? The Chair is supposed to enforce election law at the polling place!! Minnesota law only allows ONE challenger per party. And here, there were two. It’s also the Chair Judge’s responsibility to make sure integrity is maintained throughout the polling place. Better training perhaps is needed for chair judges and election judges. I served as an election judge for the first time yesterday and it was only by reading and re-reading my training materials that I felt fairly confident of what I was doing. We received one two-hour training session and given a huge stack of materials to read on our honor. But this should not be left to people’s honor. We’re talking about laws and procedures that ensure the fairness and integrity of our elections. Chairs and Election Judges should be better trained and in fact *tested* before they are allowed to administer our elections. The GOP plays dirty for sure. But they can’t play dirty unless they’re allowed to. Let’s stop them with better training of Chairs and Election Judges*. Our Minnesota election laws are some of the best in the country, but they need to be enforced to have any meaning. That enforcement comes from well informed, well trained people at the polling site. We’ve got a great Secretary of State now. Let’s back him up with solid folks on the ground.
Comment posted November 5, 2008 @ 3:48 pm
How can anyone with a modicum of decency and a brain question whether or not their was foul play in the attempt to get Coleman elected again. The snake is the epitome of corruption. George’s administration rewarded Coleman for being a low life. The new administration will not. The good people of Minnesota will not. We’d best dig and dig deep once and for all. Getting back to being a Senator may have been easy for Coleman…staying there…will NOT!
Comment posted November 5, 2008 @ 8:58 pm
well, the cockroach, is said to be the only creature that
would survive a nuclear war, i now think this filthy
disease ridden bug would have a companion even dirtier
and lower to the ground.
i used to be somewhat proud of living in a state
where voter turnout was the envy of the nation, but
if it means a lying scum bag like coleman can soil
the memory of paul wellstone by hijacking his seat
then i long for the complacency of the south….
i am sick to my stomach…
Comment posted November 6, 2008 @ 8:49 am
Could you please keep digging this story for us. We would like to know where it ends. We,Somali Americans, need that the truth is exposed.
Comment posted November 6, 2008 @ 5:37 pm
I imagine the Coleman campaign is going to claim something along the lines of “He was acting independently.”
I don’t really buy that, and even if it is the case, it’s unacceptable. He’s a member of the Coleman campaign and he’s acting like that.
Comment posted November 7, 2008 @ 1:57 am
Coleman is a slimeball. You can see it in his face and in that finger he was pointing on election night. I can’t believe he won, and I truly hope Franken gets the votes he deserves. We can’t take another two years of this.
Comment posted November 7, 2008 @ 2:17 am
Wardere is supporter of the Somali warlord president who is on CIA payroll and Republicans put in power. Wardere was instructing Somali elders from the Ceder/Riverside to vote for Coleman since it is him who did something for the community. He was said to have been urging elders to vote for Coleman and some of my friends tell me this is the case. He probably cost more than 400 votes off Al Franken. This is against the rule and needs to be investigated.
Alliyo
Comment posted November 7, 2008 @ 2:30 pm
Wardere should not be there, because if Norm Coleman gone,he is losing his job. all the votes from that area should be recounted and challenge.
Comment posted November 10, 2008 @ 9:16 am
I’m surprised that they let Wardere sit in a nearby room for so long, especially after it was clear he was there to influence the election. ANYBODY who’s not there to vote or officiate is supposed to stay more than 100 feet from the building. The guy should’ve been kicked out.
I volunteered that day with the ACLU, pollwatching by answering questions and troubleshooting any problems voters had. Even though we were truly nonpartisan, we had to stand more than 100 feet from the building.
Comment posted November 12, 2008 @ 12:51 am
If the Rove crowd was helping Coleman, then the authorities ought to simply hand the Senate victory to Franken. And MN ought to be ashamed for allowing the vote to be so close. One candidate is funny and honorable, and one isn’t.
Comment posted November 12, 2008 @ 11:26 am
Coleman the only Senator whose website has Somali translation and staffers with origin of Somalia. There is high possibility influencing voter to vote for Coleman. Somali is tend to listen from other fellow Somali – there is collective thinking for older generation.
Comment posted January 11, 2009 @ 3:12 pm
I think it is ridiculous to under estimate the Somali population, even the elderly already knew who they wanted to vote for before they came to the votting polls. So Ali & Allio go back and fix your chaotic country that is divided,do not bring your division in the this country.Wardere could not change anyone’s views and somalis are very well informed in politics.So Ali & Alio pack your bags and try to solve the issues in Somalia and let the election judges do their job.
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