A spokesman for Robert J. Higdon, Jr., who took over as the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina in September 2017, has declined to comment on why no charges were filed following the state’s criminal referrals against Dowless and other Bladen County political operatives. Justice Department spokeswoman Kelly Laco in Washington also declined to comment on Friday.
Are there no state charges that could have been brought against this guy?
Maybe the referral should have been sent elsewhere…
Later in 2017, Trump’s appointee arrived, but took no action to prosecute the matter. Instead, he assigned his staff to focus on a different priority — prosecuting a handful of non-citizens who had allegedly voted.
Better get Kris Kobach right on this matter…I hear he has some free time on his schedule these days. 
They tried,
After federal prosecutors took no action, documents show the elections board referred the case to state prosecutors in January 2018. No charges were filed before the November general election,
I think it’s safe to say the entire GOP is an extremist anti democratic institution willing to overlook or even perpetrate crimes to get and maintain power.
A day late and a schmuck short.
That’s pretty damning. As a direct result of Higdon’s decision, hundreds of thousands of people in NC will be going without representation in congress for months at the least. While he was building – badly – cases that had no purpose except political posturing.
He will likely have an interesting time in front of a congressional committee some time this spring.
“Harris, the GOP congressional candidate, said in an interview last week that it was his decision to hire Dowless, though he denied knowledge of any potential wrongdoing.”
Like the president* he did no due diligence and had no problem hiring a felon to work on his campaign. Only difference is that this guy was already a convicted felon whereas Trump’s men earned their felonies while on his campaign. But of course, that has nothing to do with Trump or Harris, they’d like us to believe.
Individual-1 attracts then pretends that ignorant trumpism assholes like this don’t exist when they are alive and multiplying.
Won’t it be fun to stand by and watch as your money and human rights slowly disappear for another two years ?
Not only is the Republican Party an extremist anti-democratic organization, it is also working with Russia to offset the fact that they are a minor party, unable to win elections without committing crimes. Newt Gingrich is finally succeeding in his goal.
Kobach is probably using all of his time to rob banks now.
I find it difficult to believe that they didn’t know Russia was using the NRA and that Citizens United wouldn’t be a convenient way to funnel foreign money to their campaigns.
Only one party wants opacity when it comes to political donations. Republicans are happy to work for the worldwide oligarchs with endless cash flows. Notice they’re all on the demonize Democrats bandwagon with trump now. They know it’s only a matter of time before enough people see they’re not working for them and all they’ve got is turning us against each other.
Why would a Trump atty go after people democratic votes? They only care about “illegals”.
I find it incredible that our own government and intelligence weren’t on to these actions from the start, and needed to be warned by Australia.
What were they doing? All this info was in the news for at least a year before the election.
There is only one major democratic (small “d”) party left in the United States.
The GOP surrendered to authoritarianism.
Same here. Tho I’m not sure what them knowing meant.
Did they know and decide not to act on it? Did they decide the only remedy was electoral/citizens? To some extent this makes sense but only up to a point beyond which it’s a massive failure.
I keep thinking it’s much like what happened when the FBI looked into right wing terrorist. They first failed to recognize the threat until it had grown and then backed off under political pressure.
Is the entire US intelligence community so hyper focused on the lesser threats of domestic Islamic terrorism and/or blinded by personal familiarity with Christofascists and the Republican Party that they ignored/shrugged it off? It definitely seems possible. The FBI is mostly white men. A fact Comey characterized as a “crisis”.
I do believe the majority of IC people are not fascist. I think they’re just slow to acknowledge what’s happening because they personally relate to the bad actors. And it’s to be seen how many will be willing to “follow orders”.
I don’t like where any of this is headed but I can’t help but think trump is forcing a showdown and it’s possible that it’s better now than later. I’ve gotta throw some optimism into the mix.
Situation Normal All Fuqed Up .
Kobach gave them the idea in the first place… all the other vote suppressor SOB SOS’s call him “Coach!”
It has been happening for quite a while.
“Through his attorney, Dowless has declined to be interviewed by state investigators.”
And they just rolled over for him? Anyone else get the feeling the local Republicans actually LIKE this crook? Imagine… where would they be without him? When unfettered gerrymandering isn’t enough to cheat to victory, you cheat every which way but “lose”…
DUH… of course there were no charges… only Democrats perpetrate election fraud.