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The Raw Story Ms. Noe's own scandal: Wife of Ohio GOP fundraiser does some election reform of her own
It's past the point where you can just cut out the rotten part, it's stinking up the whole state.

In yet another surreal twist in Ohio’s “coin-gate” scandal, the wife of
Bush’s chief Ohio fundraiser, Tom Noe—who is currently embroiled in campaign
finance and money laundering probes—surprised poll workers and observers alike
by disrupting the ballot count during the 2004 general election, RAW STORY has discovered.
Bernadette Noe, who served dual roles as chairman for the Lucas County
Republican Party and the Lucas County Board of Elections, sent twelve
“partisans” into a warehouse on Election Day, according a memo authored by
Ohio’s Director of Campaign Finance Richard Weghorst who was present at the
time.
But perhaps the most striking event directly linked to Ms. Noe was what
Weghorst described as “a note-worthy incident relating to security” on the
evening of the election.
Weghorst, who was present at a local warehouse where
ballots were being tabulated, says in his report that “two groups of partisan
volunteers totaling approximately twelve people" arrived, whose "purpose for
being there was not immediately known nor requested."
When the volunteers
refused to leave the premises, Weghorst called the police, who then escorted the
group away from the warehouse. It later emerged they had come at Ms. Noe's
request.
A Diebold employee, Robert Diekmann, was also present at the
warehouse that night.
Ms. Noe was an advocate of Diebold’s optical scan software as chair of the
Lucas County Board of Elections. In April 2004, she and another fellow
Republican board member voted to approve a $350,000 contract with Diebold to
lease machines for the election. The county was forced the lease the equipment
after a deadlock and a rebuke from Blackwell.
The contract was no-bid. After Democrats on the board revealed a cheaper
bid from another company, the Lucas County board was forced to open the contract
for bidding, over Ms. Noe’s objections.
The contract was eventually awarded to Diebold.
Reminiscent of an account reported on by RAW
STORY regarding ballot tampering in Clermont
County, Ohio, Ms. Noe was involved in an incident through which Republican
volunteers were brought in to “assist” processing returned voter confirmation
postcards. On her authority and that of several other board members, partisan
volunteers were allowed to copy the returned cards.
They were subsequently
caught by a Lucas County Democratic official peeling the return stickers off the
voter confirmation cards, and were told to leave. Weghorst’s inquiry found no
evidence they had been supervised.
In April, the Toledo Blade reported
Ms. Noe acted improperly as chairman of the Lucas County Republican Party in
accepting $65,000 in loans for the party from her husband. She is also involved
in a scandal surrounding an aide to Ohio governor Bob Taft (R) staying for a
reduced rate at her
vacation home.
Bernadette Noe is married to the now-infamous
Tom Noe, who invested millions of dollars of state funds into rare coins and who
is currently the target of a wide-ranging inquiry. Noe, a Bush Pioneer, also
allegedly laundered money into President Bush’s reelection campaign by paying
others to donate.
Tom Noe, the owner of several shady business ventures,
including Vintage Coins and Collectibles, funneled an estimated fifty million
dollars into his own personal and business accounts as well as to the state’s
GOP candidates. Noe’s rare coin venture came at the expense of The Ohio Bureau
of Workers' Compensation, for whom he acted as the sole fund manager.