Is ACORN Sprouting in Spartanburg County?

To try and combat the “Vote early, and vote often” mindset, I was going to write a little reminder on election day.

I was going to say that if you saw something wrong with your polling place and thought there was something funny going on, there are a bunch of folks you can call.

The federal Justice Department has a voting section in its civil rights division and will take calls at (800) 253-3931. They’ll send federal investigators if they think it’s appropriate.

The US Attorney and the FBI will take calls, too. You can get in touch with them by calling (803) 929-3052 for the US Attorney’s Office in Columbia or (803) 551-4200 for Columbia’s FBI office.

It looks like somebody may want to think about using those phone numbers a little earlier than Tuesday, though.

A buddy up in Spartanburg said that van loads of people are showing up today at Spartanburg County’s Office of Registrations and Elections to vote “Absentee,” but that he heard from the inside that the strict requirements to do it weren’t being followed.

Apparently at one point there were some tough words between some of the people driving the vans and one of the county’s political party officials, too.

I wish I had more right now, but if you’ve got pictures or know more about what happened, let me know.

In this election, who knows how far the ACORN fell from the tree?

– Bo Burdette

UPDATE (4:20pm): Spartanburg’s Jason Spencer at the HERALD-JOURNAL wrote a piece today about poll watchers keeping tabs on election day.