Worley Watch: Illegal Immigrant Edition (redux)

I originally reported here on the Worley controversy over voter registration, illegal immigrants, and citizenship. In summary, it was alleged that Nancy Worley, the Secretary of State and chief state election official, instructed voter registrars that they could not follow-up on a person's citizenship status, even on a person who had marked they were not a citizen on the application.

Since Mo Brooks, a candidate for Lieutenant Governor, was cited as the source of the information that was presented to the Madison County Commission, I contacted him about this issue. He replied:

"The information [about Worley's instructions] is from the Madison County Board of Registrars. A transcript of their statements to the Madison County Commission on December 19, 2005 is attached.

"All the Mo Brooks Campaign for Lt. Governor did was send a very brief cover letter to a lot of people with the transcript attached. I sent it as part of an effort to further highlight the illegal alien problems we must confront, and confront soon.

"What Ala. Secretary of State Nancy Worley appears to have done (according to various Boards of Registrars members in three different counties) is wrong and must be corrected (either by an admission by Worley that she uttered the instructions and is rescinding them or a statement by Worley that she never intended to convey what the voter registrars say they heard)."

The transcript of statements made to the Madison County Commission are available here: Pages 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, and 14.

The Huntsville Times reported on this story 12 January 2006. In that story, Worley denied giving those instructions to voter registrars. The story states:

Worley and a secretary of state's office attorney, Adam Bourne, said federal law gives voter applicants a presumption that their voter registration forms are truthful. Registrars cannot arbitrarily ask applicants their citizenship status unless there is a compelling and specific reason to do so, Worley said.

Not surprisingly, Worley falls back on making excuses. Rather than consider that her instructions may have been unclear or, in fact, wrong, Worley stated:

"When I started getting calls about what he attributed to me that I knew were untrue, I checked out the source and figured it to be political grandstanding.

"It's an attention-getter because he's running for lieutenant governor."

It seems, however, that if the instructions she claims to have given were the actual instructions that Worley gave to the registrars, the registrars would not have felt that checking citizenship was off limits regardless of circumstances.

If Worley's comments were taken out of context or simply misunderstood, hopefully she has issued a clarification to ensure that the voter registrars understand what their legal obligations and options under these circumstances.

Somehow, though, Worley's track record does not inspire confidence. Remember, she has told voter registrars to ignore the state constitution regarding the voting rights of convicted felons - and is being sued over that issue - despite clear guidance from the Attorney General on what the constitution requires.