Trump Campaign CEO Steve Bannon is Registered Voter at Vacant Florida Home
theg uardian.com/us-news/2016/aug/26/steve-bannon-florida-registered-vote-donald-trump
Exclusive: Bannon’s enrollment is apparent violation of crucial swing state’s election law requiring voters to be legal residents of county they register in.
Donald Trump’s new presidential campaign chief is registered to vote in a key swing state at an empty house where he does not live, in an apparent breach of election laws.
Stephen Bannon, the chief executive of Trump’s election campaign, has an active voter registration at the house in Miami-Dade County, Florida, which is vacant and due to be demolished to make way for a new development.
“I have emptied the property,” Luis Guevara, the owner of the house, which is in the Coconut Grove section of the city, said in an interview. “Nobody lives there … we are going to make a construction there.” Neighbors said the property had been abandoned for several months.
Bannon, 62, formerly rented the house for use by his ex-wife, Diane Clohesy, but did not live there himself. Clohesy, a Tea Party activist, moved out of the house earlier this year and has her own irregular voting registration arrangement. According to public records, Bannon and Clohesy divorced seven years ago.
Bannon previously rented another house for Clohesy in Miami from 2013 to 2015 and assigned his voter registration to the property during that period. But a source with direct knowledge of the rental agreement for this house said Bannon did not live there either, and that Bannon and Clohesy were not in a relationship.
Bannon, Clohesy and Trump’s campaign repeatedly declined to answer detailed questions about Bannon’s voting arrangements. Jason Miller, a Trump campaign spokesman, eventually said in an email: “Mr Bannon moved to another location in Florida.” Miller declined to answer further questions.
Bannon is executive chairman of the rightwing website Breitbart News, which has for years aggressively claimed that voter fraud is rife among minorities and in Democratic-leaning areas. The allegation has been repeated forcefully on the campaign trail by Trump, who has predicted the election will be “rigged” and warned supporters that victory could be fraudulently “taken away from us”.
But it is not clear that Bannon is actually entitled to vote in Florida, one of the most important prizes for Trump and Hillary Clinton in their quest for the 270 electoral votes they need to secure the White House in November’s general election.
Details of the apparent breach of election laws by Trump’s campaign chief came as it was revealed that Bannon was once charged with misdemeanor domestic violence after a violent argument with his first wife. Court documents first obtained by Politico describe how, in 1996, his wife was left with red marks on her neck and wrist after the New Year’s Day argument at their home in Santa Monica, California, which began when she woke early to feed their twin daughters and he “got upset at her for making noise”.
The case was closed after Bannon’s ex-wife failed to appear in court to testify to the accusations. Five months later, she filed to dissolve their marriage. In a police report of the 1996 altercation, she described three or four previous arguments that “became physical”.
Bannon, who only recently came into the Trump camp in a move to reset the ailing campaign, is now under fresh scrutiny over his right to vote.
Under Florida law, voters must be legal residents of the state and of the county where they register to vote. Guidelines from the Florida department of state say that Florida courts and state authorities have defined legal residency as the place “where a person mentally intends to make his or her permanent residence”.
Wilfully submitting false information on a Florida voter registration – or helping someone to do so – is a third-degree felony punishable by up to five years in prison.
Election officials in Miami-Dade make clear to prospective voters that they are required to actually live in the county and to use their home address in election paperwork. “You must reside in Miami-Dade County,” their website states. It adds: “When you register to vote, an actual residence address is required by law.” A county spokeswoman did not respond to questions relating to Bannon’s situation.
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