Democrat Compton City Councilman Charged With Bribery And Election Rigging Photos: Facebook / Credit:JJ Gouin
Isaac Galvan has been charged with rigging a city council election that he won by one vote in Compton, a South Los Angeles city that was once predominately African American but is now 68 percent Hispanic or Latino.
Galvan defeated challenger Andre Spicer, a Black Compton native, entrepreneur, and media personality, by a vote of 855 to 854.
Black people comprise 28.9 percent of the Compton population.
According to authorities, Galvan, 34, was among six people charged with conspiracy to commit fraud in the election, the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office said in a statement.
Galvan and Jace Dawson, a former council candidate, rigged a June runoff election to ensure Galvan would retain his seat, prosecutors allege.
Four people who didn’t live in the predominately Latino suburb registered as city voters using Dawson’s address. They’re accused of voting illegally, U.S. News & World Report reported.
Galvan was first elected in 2013 and describes himself as the city’s youngest and first Latino city councilman in Compton, The Los Angeles Times reported.
“Elections are the cornerstone of our democratic nation. We must do everything in our power to protect the integrity of the electorate process and to ensure that elections are free and fair,” Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. George Gascón said in a statement.
Twitter users were all over it.
“Wait a min… I thought we don’t have election fraud in this country,” tweeted B @albarabasibogaard.
“No one said we didn’t,” Sherry Evans – The GQP is destroying America @SpevansEvans replied. “But in order to claim there was fraud, you must have proof. You can’t cry fraud just because you don’t like the results. You need hard evidence. Conspiracy theories don’t count as proof. Going on TV and whining about suspected fraud also isn’t proof.”
Galvan’s name has been linked to multiple corruption scandals.
In November 2020, federal investigators served a search warrant at his home as part of an investigation into marijuana licensing practices, sources told The Times. The search came months after a former police officer signed a sworn statement that he’d had complaints from three cannabis dispensary operators alleging “questionable business practices, which included paying as much as $250,000 cash in a brown paper bag to city officials.”
And earlier this year, Galvan was subpoenaed to testify in grand jury proceedings that led prosecutors to bring corruption and bribery charges against former Maywood Mayor Ramon Medina and nine others, The Times reported.
Photos: Facebook / Credit:JJ Gouin
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