Dem House candidate encourages illegal aliens to vote for her

It's common knowledge that since Democrats have been losing elections en masse for the last 12 years, they have resorted to trying to gin up new voting bases among groups of people who do not have the right to vote (and trying to find creative ways to get these people to vote...illegally): illegal aliens, incarcerated felons, paroled felons who have not had their voting rights restored, dead people, family pets, and multiple-time voters. I guess losing tends to breed such desparation.

As a result, this should come as no surprise. From San Diego:

If an election can turn on a sentence, this could be the one: “You don't need papers for voting.”

On Thursday night, Francine Busby, the Democratic candidate for the 50th Congressional District, was speaking before a largely Latino crowd in Escondido when she uttered those words. She said yesterday she simply misspoke.

But someone taped it and a recording began circulating yesterday. After she made that statement at the meeting, Busby immediately said: “You don't need to be a registered voter to help (the campaign).”

She said that subsequent statement was to clarify what she meant.

The recording, which was played yesterday on Roger Hedgecock's radio talk show, jolted the campaign.

Busby, a Cardiff school board member, is in a tight race with Republican Brian Bilbray, a congressman-turned-lobbyist, who has based his campaign on a tough anti-illegal-immigration stance. Busby has focused her campaign on ethics reform. The two are vying to replace Randy “Duke” Cunningham, who was jailed after pleading guilty to taking bribes.

Busby said she was invited to the forum at the Jocelyn Senior Center in Escondido by the leader of a local soccer league. Many of the 50 or so people there were Spanish speakers. Toward the end, a man in the audience asked in Spanish: “I want to help, but I don't have papers.”

It was translated and Busby replied: “Everybody can help, yeah, absolutely, you can all help. You don't need papers for voting, you don't need to be a registered voter to help.”

Bilbray said at worst, Busby was encouraging someone to vote illegally. At best, she was encouraging someone who is illegally in the country to work on her campaign.

“She's soliciting illegal aliens to campaign for her and it's on tape – this isn't exactly what you call the pinnacle of ethical campaign strategy,” Bilbray said. “I don't know how she shows her face.”

That's their modus operandi, Bilbray...that's how she shows her face. Continuing:

Earlier, San Diego Minutemen volunteer Anthony Porrello said he got the tape from an an anonymous Minuteman and passed it on to the news media and talk radio. News of the gathering had circulated among local Minutemen before the meeting, according to William Griffith, the independent candidate in the race who has been endorsed by the San Diego Minutemen.

He attended, but did not hear the statement. He said he was in the back of the room.

“I heard what I expected to hear from a Democrat who supports amnesty,” he said. Busby says she doesn't support amnesty, but backs the comprehensive plan pushed by U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., that includes opening a path to citizenship for people in the United States illegally if they pay penalties and abide by certain conditions.

How Kerryesque of her! "I don't support amnesty, but I support McCain's Senate bill...which is amnesty!"

Maybe she did mispeak...a Freudian slip, perhaps?