Durnham, D

<p>CO 2008 obama but gop landslide 2010; worst vote machines, so promised to get rid after 2012; purged felons tho not illegal for them to vote; indeed illegal to purge 90 days so time to contest; done by Drew Durnham, ex asst to TX AG (who said he was racist) 184</p>

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Donetta co sec of state for job chair of FEAC (still exists but gop won't allow any appts, so empty?)</p>

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wsj runs John Fund bs</p>

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Tova Wang (legit academic) did book on fraud w/ rw guy, but another book put out undersame name w/ her name 186 [2 guys on booktv?]; her boss donetta davison kept her from testifying; did anyway, fired but  beat attack w/ pro bono lawyer 188</p>

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Looks like the <a href="http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36%7E64%7E2481761,00.html">Denver Post</a> got some phone calls returned. The wild story of Colorado HAVA director <a href="http://www.rmpn.org/weblog/archives3/permalink/003004.cfm">Drew T. Durham</a> begins to shift, towards an examination of exactly what he <em>does</em> at the Secretary of State's office:</p>

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<p>Here's where they (finally!) get it:</p>

<div style=" text-align: left; text-indent: 2em; line-height: 12pt; font: arial, sans-serif; font-weight: normal; font-size: 10pt; color: black; background-color: white; border-width: thin; border: 1px solid; width: 400px; padding: 10px;">Durham testified in a recent court case that challenged Colorado's voter- ID requirements and its policies for out-of-precinct voting and absentee voting. Durham appeared as the state's top monitor of voters' problems. Richard Daily, the lawyer who represented the secretary of state's office in the case, called Durham the person Colorado voters could turn to if they had trouble at the polls. Daily called Durham an expert in voting law who had handled "dozens" of cases. "I didn't say he was an expert," Davidson said late Wednesday night. "He had election experience in Texas, and I did check that out before I hired him." Lawyers who worked with Durham in Texas challenged that experience. "I can tell you to a certainty that when I was in the attorney general's office, Drew was not involved in voting rights cases," said Joe Cruz, a former Texas assistant attorney general. "The short of it is that Drew Durham is not an expert in voting law," added another former assistant attorney general, Renee Hicks. Although Cruz and Hicks never heard Durham utter any racial slurs, both expressed "concern" that Durham would be put in charge of protecting minority voting concerns. So did Texas NAACP president Gary Bledsoe, another former lawyer in the Texas attorney general's office. Bledsoe said Durham killed a legislative bill that would have allowed Texas to study disparities in criminal justice between whites and minorities...</div>

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<p>Bottom line: if you have a problem at the polls a week from Tuesday, <em>you'll be talking to Drew</em>...maybe this helps explain the urgency...?</p>

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<h1 id="page-title" class="asset-name entry-title">Drew T. Durham: the friend of consumers and warblers</h1>

<div class="asset-meta"><span class="byline"><abbr class="published" title="2006-01-09T14:48:00-07:00">January 9, 2006 2:48 PM</abbr></span></div>

<div class="header-box">| <a href="http://progressnowcolorado.pnstate.org/site/TellAFriend?page=http://www.progressnowcolorado.org/CHrq">Tell a friend</a> | <a href="http://www.progressnowcolorado.org/blog/2006/01/CHrq.php">Link to Entry</a>

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<div class="asset-body">Off and on over the last year, and more intensively in the weeks since two major IT contracts the state of Colorado signed with Bermuda-based Accenture Corp. <a href="http://rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_4364513,00.html">went to hell</a>, we've had our eye on the fascinating story of former Colorado HAVA Director and Texas Deputy Attorney General <a href="http://www.progressnowcolorado.org/page/community/post/al/CHJX">Drew T. Durham</a>.

When we first looked at Mr. Durham we were concerned about an alleged history of racist inferences and epithets, as reported by <a href="http://www.progressnowcolorado.org/page/community/post/al/C3Jx">former Texas contemporaries</a>. Then we started looking at <a href="http://www.progressnowcolorado.org/page/community/post/al/C3KQ">his role</a> in the awarding of the Accenture contracts at Labor and State (months before they became press disaster spectacles, mind you).

Last Thursday we revealed <a href="http://www.progressnowcolorado.org/page/community/post/al/CHcX">some ties we've identified</a> between then-Deputy AG Durham and the litigation to shut down the now-storied Speaking Rock Casino run by the Tigua Indians in El Paso, Texas. The Jack Abramoff Tiguas. This until-then side angle on our little narrative has generated a pretty large spike in traffic to our website -- proving, among other things, that it's a small world after all.

While the patient reader awaits the next update from this mountain of research I'm desperately trying to plow through before school starts next week, here's a couple more interesting tidbits about the man Donetta Davidson was so impressed with that she never even considered anyone else for the HAVA job...

<blockquote>"We <a href="http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_3369071">did not open it up</a>" to other applicants, [Davidson] said, and "I didn't have to open it up."</blockquote>

Presumably because he's such a heck of a guy, with glowing recommendations from the likes of now-Senator John Cornyn of newfound Tigua/Abramoff fame. Surely nothing to see there.

In retrospect, and given all the interesting things I'm reading about ole' boy Drew T. Durham in the Texas papers, let's hope he was a better friend to Colorado voters and unemployed workers than he was to Texas consumers and golden-cheeked warblers (and don't forget those Tigua Indians). From the October 15, 1994 <i>Austin American-Statesman</i>:

<b>Advocating death of endangered species was joke</b>

<blockquote>A top official of the state attorney general's office says he was joking when he suggested that the endangered species issue in Texas could be resolved by simply killing such species...

Drew Durham, deputy attorney general for criminal justice, drew the criticism for remarks he made at a meeting on property rights in Georgetown on Sept. 21. Most of those attending were property rights proponents, who contend that the Endangered Species Act and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service are violating constitutional rights.

A videotape of the meeting produced by Williamson County Cablevision shows that Durham opened his speech with a reference to Sterling County, his home county.

"If you look on that map of the state of Texas, there's no endangered species in Sterling County, and that's because I followed (state) Sen. Bill Sims' advice a long time ago. <b>We killed 'em all</b>," Durham said.

Durham also told the audience, <b>"Being the deputy attorney general and doing all the criminal justice issues for the attorney general, I'm also the chief executioner, and I don't think that speaks well for the warbler."</b>

That was a reference to the golden-cheeked warbler, an endangered songbird...

"Drew has not denied that he teasingly made those comments," said Ron Dusek, press secretary for Attorney General Dan Morales. "There's nothing to investigate. <b>We all know Drew</b>."</blockquote>

Well, Texas knows Drew anyway. Colorado, I suppose, didn't need to know. The December 8, 1997 edition of the <i>Texas Lawyer</i> has a little more on Drew Durham, Friend of the Little Guy:

<blockquote>Morales' controversial head of his criminal justice division, Drew Durham, pulled double duty. Durham presided over a vastly increased criminal justice department and became a powerful freelancer within the agency, moving from crime to issues like <b>property rights</b>. In September 1994, Durham told a property rights gathering that his role as the state's "chief executioner" didn't bode well for endangered species.

Durham and First Assistant Jorge Vega, a Harvard Law School classmate of Morales, also carried out wholesale changes in the agency's consumer protection division in early 1994 -- just after Morales had learned he would face no Democratic opposition in that year's primary...</blockquote>

And then came that $17.5 billion Texas tobacco lawsuit, the highest rate of execution of any state (compliments of Drew Durham), the disintegration of Dan Morales, the Tiguas, Drew's move to Colorado, the plum jobs for the taking...stay tuned, friends. As it turns out, that man behind the curtain is kind of interesting.</div>

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