Bradley Schlozman

In investigating election fraud matters the Justice Department must refrain from any conduct which has the possibility of affecting the election itself. A criminal investigation by armed, badged, federal agents runs the obvious risk of chilling legitimate voting and campaign activities...It should also be kept in mind that any investigation undertaken during the final stages of a political content may cause the investigation itself to become a campaign issue. Many, if not most, allegations during this period come from political partisans who are actively involved in the election

The above statement was official Department of Justice policy regarding when it’s appropriate to bring voter fraud investigations and prosecutions in 2006. Bradley Schlozman unilaterally abandoned this practice. In March, 2006, two weeks after the Patriot Act extended to the administration the ability to appoint interim U.S. Attorney's for an indefinite period of time without Senate confirmation, Schlozman was appointed U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Missouri. One week before the 2006 Election, and in the midst of the heated McCaskill/Talent U.S. Senate race he initiated indictments against three ACORN workers. In June 5, 2007, Schlozman appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) asked him if waiting until after the election to bring the indictments would have hurt the prosecution. Schlozman responded by saying, "I doubt there would have been any impact on the actual prosecution."

Prior to his post in Missouri, Schlozman served in the front office of the Civil Rights Division as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General, the Principle Deputy Assistant Attorney General and Acting Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights. In these roles, Schlozman was part the team of political appointees responsible for approving the Texas redistricting submission over the recommendation of career staff and was Acting Assistant Attorney General when the controversial Georgia photo ID law was approved. He was behind frustrating the attempts of career staff to continue the mission of the Section by refusing to pursue promising investigations when those investigations revealed discrimination in African-American and Native-American communities. He was central to implementation of the changes in the hiring process and interference with personnel matters that drained the department of the institutional knowledge of long serving civil servants, replacing them with inexperienced hires who were selected not for their abilities and demonstrated commitment to civil rights, but because of their political predilections.

In 2005, Schlozman also signed off on a new direction in National Voting Rights Act litigation. In 2005, with Schlozman's approval, the focus of NVRA enforcement was shifted from expanding registration opportunities to purging voters from registration rolls to fight the false specter of voting fraud. The changes were thrown out in a 2007 Missouri federal court case that found the Department did not prove any voter fraud had occurred as a result of bloated registration lists and, instead, administrative problems were more than likely the cause of some jurisdictions having more registered voters than eligible residents. The court also noted the Department provided no evidence of voter fraud or evidence any voter was denied the right to vote.