Skip navigation

Ex-GOP official sentenced over phone-jamming

Tobin gets 10 months in prison for snarling N.H. Democrat phone lines in ’02

NBC Video: Politics
GOP wants Reid to apologize for slavery remark
  Dec. 8: Republican Party, lead by Chairman Michael Steele, is calling for Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid to apologize for likening health care overhaul opponents to those who resisted putting an end to slavery. Political pundits debate.

Slideshow
Image: The Week in Political Cartoons
  The Week in Political Cartoons
Msnbc.com’s political cartoonists take a look back at the past week.

more photos

updated 5:28 p.m. ET May 17, 2006

CONCORD, N.H. - A former Republican National Committee official was sentenced Wednesday to 10 months in prison for his role in the jamming of New Hampshire Democrats’ telephones on Election Day 2002.

James Tobin, 45, was found guilty in December of harassment by telephone.

Prosecutors said he helped arrange more than 800 hang-up calls that jammed get-out-the-vote phone lines set up by the state Democratic Party and the Manchester firefighters union for about an hour. Republican John Sununu defeated then-Gov. Jeanne Shaheen for the Senate that day in what had been considered a cliffhanger.

Story continues below ↓
advertisement | your ad here

At the time, Tobin was a regional official with the RNC and the National Republican Senatorial Committee, overseeing Senate campaigns in several states, including New Hampshire and Maine.

He later became New England chairman of President Bush’s 2004 re-election campaign but stepped down when Democrats accused him of playing a role in the jamming.

In addition to the prison sentence, he received a $10,000 fine and two years of probation.

© 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Sponsored links

Resource guide