AP via Sun-Times: 
 
Calls made to White House before voting scam 
 
April 11, 2006 
 
BY LARRY MARGASAK 
 
 WASHINGTON -- Key figures in a phone-jamming scheme designed to keep New Hampshire Democrats from voting in 2002 had regular contact with the White House and Republican Party as the plan was unfolding, phone records introduced in criminal court show. 
 
 The records show that Bush campaign operative James Tobin, who recently was convicted in the case, made two dozen calls to the White House within a three-day period around Election Day 2002 -- as the phone jamming operation was finalized, carried out and then abruptly shut down. 
 
 The national Republican Party, which paid millions in legal bills to defend Tobin, says the contacts involved routine election business and that it is "preposterous" to suggest the calls involved phone jamming. 
 
 The Justice Department has secured three convictions in the case but hasn't accused any White House or national Republican officials of wrongdoing, nor made any allegations suggesting party officials outside of New Hampshire were involved. 
 
The phone records of calls to the White House were exhibits in Tobin's trial but prosecutors did not make them part of their case. 
 
 Democrats plan to ask a federal judge today to order GOP and White House officials to answer questions about the phone jamming in a civil lawsuit alleging voter fraud. 
 
Hang-up calls jammed lines 
 
 Repeated hang-up calls that jammed phone lines at a Democratic get-out-the-vote center occurred in a Senate race in which Republican John Sununu defeated Democrat Jeanne Shaheen, 51 percent to 46 percent, on Nov. 5, 2002. 
 
 By Nov. 4, 2002, the Monday before the election, an Idaho firm was hired to make the hang-up calls. 
 
The Republican state chairman at the time, John Dowd, said he learned of the scheme that day and tried to stop it. 
 
AP