Ward Connerly

Ward Connerly is businessman turned right-wing operative who is leading a "rollback road-trip" in five states this year, sponsoring ballot initiatives to eliminate affirmative action programs in Arizona, Colorado, Missouri, Oklahoma and Nebraska.

In 1973, Connerly started his own consulting firm called Connerly & Associates, and has since then lobbied for housing, building, and public-works construction industries. As a member University of California Board of Regents for 12 terms (starting in 1993), Connerly focused the nation's attention on the University's race-based system of preferences in its admissions policy, which resulted in the University system banning affirmative action as a means of admission.

Connerly led voter-approved anti-affirmative action ballot campaigns in 1996 with California Proposition 209, in 1998 with Washington's Initiative 200 and in 2006 with Michigan's Proposal 2. Connerly was accused of defrauding Michigan voters by using deceptive language and dirty signature-gathering tricks to confuse them into signing his petitions in 2006. In a lawsuit filed against Connerly after the Michigan signatures were submitted, Judge Arthur Tarnow ruled that "The Court finds that MCRI engaged in systematic voter fraud by telling voters that they were signing a petition supporting affirmative action. ..." He also came under investigation for potentially illegally channeling millions of dollars through his non-profit organizations to support his affirmative action rollbacks while at the same time lining his own pockets for personal financial gain. In addition, Connerly and his lobbying firm have been paid millions of dollars by lucrative contracting firms who stand to benefit directly from the elimination of affirmative action programs.

What is this Strategy Really About?

With a base depressed about its choice of candidates, conservatives are desperate, and they are currently circulating what they hope will be their gay marriage-style gimmick for 2008. They hope to use ballot initiatives to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat in this year's presidential election.  Connerly is trying to force a complex dialogue about race in America into simplistic and highly misleading ballot strategy.

Despite Connerly's claims to the contrary, this is a racially divisive issue.

Connerly claims that affirmative action policies are antiquated. That might be true in the minds of white voters who never faced an uneven playing field in admissions or hiring.  However, using the phrase "ending preferential treatment" is loaded and misleading.The beneficiaries of civil rights programs fundamentally disagree about the programs' continued efficacy.  People of color, and many others who benefit from equality-based policies, don't see Connerly as a reformer, but as a dangerous reactionary on a bizarre mission to roll back hard-won gains. Michigan Prop 2 passed 58/42 in 2006.  According to vote analysis:

• White voters supported by a margin of 64 to 36

• 86% of African Americans opposed

• 70% of non-white men opposed

• 82% of non-white women opposed

Connerly's accusations of fraud continue in 2008

There is no reason to think he isn't using the same kind of tactics used to qualify affirmative action in Michigan in Arizona, Colorado, Missouri, Nebraska, and Oklahoma this year. Ironically, if his agenda were truly populist as he claims, he would not need to work so hard to fool voters into supporting his rollbacks. New evidence is pointing to his continued use of deception and lies to get these measures on the ballot. Voters in Colorado, Missouri and Oklahoma are coming forward with claims that circulators lied to them about the petition's true objective. A young woman in Colorado was told by a circulator that current federal discrimination laws were to expire in July and by signing the petition, she would help "end all discrimination in Colorado."

You have to judge a man by the company he keeps. Connerly claims supporters of affirmative action are racist, yet the only organization that supported him in 2006 was the Ku Klux Klan. Connerly was even videotaped praising the KKK's endorsement of his civil rights rollback in Michigan. In addition, Connerly has alienated businesses and chambers of commerce, such as the Detroit Regional Chamber and National Association of Women in Business of the Greater Detroit Area, who recognize that ending affirmative action is a one-way ticket to losing talented students and good jobs in the states.

Is Connerly really the ideologue he claims to be?

The fact that he has made piles of money in the process of tricking voters into thinking they're supporting civil rights, calls his motives into question, and voters should know that these efforts provide a lucrative income for him. In August of 2006, a red flag was raised by Congressmen John Conyers (D-Mich.) and Charles Rangel  (D-N.Y) regarding the excessive salary Connerly receives from his non-profit organization. The two Representatives asked the IRS to investigate whether Connerly was violating federal tax laws on excessive compensation. Ms. Magazine recently reported that in 2006, "Connerly received $1.6 million -- 66 percent of the $2.4 million in revenues his nonprofits generated that year," to pay his salary, benefits, fees for speaking, media interviews, consulting and expenses.

Click for a printable report on Connerly: June 2008 Memo on Ward Connerly 

Status of the Ballot Initiatives

It should be noted that while each of the so-called  "civil rights initiative" campaigns have their own state sponsors, these initiatives are part of a nationally funded effort by Ward Connerly.

Arizona & Nebraska: Fraud Merchants at Work 

• Deadline: July 3^rd (Arizona) and 4^th (Nebraska)
• Status: Circulating with reports of fraud

The deadline for Connerly to turn in valid signatures in Arizona is July 3^rd, but it was reported by the Arizona Republic that Connerly is "having difficulty recruiting petition circulators for the initiative and are short on cash", and that he is "struggling to gather enough signatures to qualify their initiative for the ballot."

In Nebraska the deadline for signatures is the 4^th of July. As the Omaha World Herald exposed, "What is happening is that California businessman Ward Connerly is attempting to foist his will on the people of Nebraska with a race-fixated drive to change our constitution."

While Connerly has made millions while he blames others for his problems, all roads lead to his own paid signature gathering firm, National Ballot Access.

National Ballot Access, a signature gathering firm based in Georgia, was incorporated by two women: Mary Edith "Edee" Baggett and Heidi Verougstraete and both have a long history of allegedly engaging in initiative fraud, including Nebraska.

Colorado: Deception and Lawsuit 

• Deadline: Already passed
• Status: Signatures submitted with fraud
• Current state of the effort: Lawsuit underway

There have been numerous reports of Connerly's signature gatherers misleading and deceiving voters, even going so far as to cynically target African Americans in Colorado at a Martin Luther King Day parade and a Barack Obama rally, asking them to "end discrimination."

Despite the fact that signature gatherers are required by law to be Colorado residents, Connerly told the Associated Press that "about half" of his circulators were from out of state.

Currently, the signatures Connerly has submitted to the state are being challenged as the subject of a lawsuit. The lawsuit alleges that about 56,000 signatures on the ballot petition don't match names on Colorado's voter registration list. It also documents that 4,539 other signatures appeared more than once and that 1,799 were collected by people who weren't Colorado residents, in violation of state law. In all, the suit challenges the validity of 68,948 names.

Missouri: Deception, Desperation, Defeat 

• Deadline: Already passed
• Status: He failed to submit signatures despite offereing $10 per signature in the end
• Current state of the effort: He claims he'll be back

As part of a pattern seen in other states, Connerly faced charges of deceiving citizens in Missouri as well.

In an act of desperation to meet his signature gathering deadline in the state Connerly made a national push to recruit people into Missouri to collect signatures for his effort to re-write the Missouri constitution. Most troubling were reports that recruiting efforts including a racist group from California, the Minutemen. In addition, it was reported that that one of your signature gathers was picked up by police because he is wanted in three states for voter fraud related charges.  It has also been reported that that one of Connerly's signature gatherers was picked up by police because he is wanted in three states for voter fraud related charges. 

Connerly was defeated in Missouri as he failed to gain enough citizen support to get his initiative on the ballot.

Oklahoma: Fraud and Irregularities 

• Deadline: Already passed
• Status: Signature challenge underway
• Current state of the effort: In essence, dead 

While Connerly's initiative is currently, technically qualified for the ballot, in an unprecedented move, he has requested to have it withdrawn in an acknowledgement that fraud and irregularities plague the petitions he has submitted to the state.

The Oklahoma Secretary of State has referred a report on Connerly's signature petitions to the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court citing numerous problems with the signatures including; circulators who signed the petition multiple times, numerous duplicates, and ninety-two people who gave different versions of the same address. 

Fraud Wire