Conservatives are lambasting a North Carolina man who joked on Facebook about committing voter fraud.
On Friday, 69-year-old retiree Jim Turner posted on his Facebook wall that he’d already voted several times at different North Carolina locations and was planning to vote once more in his hometown of Pine Knoll Shores, N.C.
“I have voted once in Befort, once in Henderson, twice in Emerald Isle and will vote in my precinct in PKS,” Turner wrote on his wall. “I will do whatever it takes to save our country from the world envisioned by Mitt and his fear mongering followers.”
Turner eventually deleted the post from his Facebook page, claiming that it was intended to be a private message to his daughter and that it was a joke. Unfortunately for him, Romney’s “fear mongering followers” screengrabbed it before its deletion and spread it around as if it were truth.
Among the sites to pick up Turner’s post was Barracuda Brigade, a blog that’s“100% committed to common sense conservative principles and defeating Barack Obama in November 2012.” The site is reporting that they spoke with Turner on the phone, and he confirmed that he indeed wrote the post.
Turner himself confirmed that he had made the statement in a second Facebook post, which is still visible on his page.
“I posted a comment to Jami’s page earlier today and it now lives in cybersomewhere. I can’t seem to get with the whole facebook thing. I made bold comment on the future of my grandchildren under a Romney presidency and now it is gone. I think my comments were deleted as part of a conspiracy inspired by some who see our national glass as half empty.”
The posting has been reshared 166 times, largely by conservatives.
On Saturday, the Examiner wrote that they had emails stating that Turner was under investigation by the state’s Board of Election.
On Monday, however, that same Board of Elections dismissed any accusations of impropriety.
“The posting was meant as a joke for his daughter only,” a representative told WRAL, “he seems very distraught and has retained an attorney to handle the media.”
That hasn’t stopped conservatives from making things difficult for the retiree. Various local news outlets are reporting that Turner and his family have received threats because of the joke.
Meanwhile, a Republican woman was arrested on Friday— the same day that Turner made his comments— for trying to commit voter fraud in Las Vegas, Nev.
Photo via Fairfax County/Flickr
