Obama Campaign Website Invites Fraud
Gee, why would a Presidential campaign that has rejected public funding and thus is desperately in need of constant infusions of cash in order to stay afloat want to invite fraudulent contributions?
What accounts for the Obama campaign’s acceptance of these fraudulent donations? Most merchants selling goods and services use the basic Address Verification System that screens credit-card charges for matching names and addresses. (It can also screen cards issued by foreign banks.) The McCain campaign uses AVS and provides a searchable database of all donors, including those who fall below the $200 threshold. The Obama campaign apparently has chosen not to use the AVS system to screen donations.
“Della Ware” contacted The New York Times to report her experience contributing under a fictitious name and address (“12345 No Way”) to the Obama campaign, while her contribution was rejected by the McCain campaign. Times reporter Michael Luo verified “Della Ware’s” account and reported it online at the Times’ campaign blog. But Luo missed the story’s point.
“To be fair to the Obama campaign,” he wrote, its “officials have said much of their checking for fraud occurs after the transactions have already occurred. When they find something wrong, they then refund the amount.”
But the Obama campaign is running a system that complicates the discovery of “something wrong.” It has chosen to operate an online contribution system that facilitates illegal falsely sourced contributions, illegal foreign contributions and the evasion of contribution limits.
Obama’s fund raising needs a thorough investigation, but it won’t get one.
