(Image source: Detroit Free Press)

BY ALANA YOUNG

ANCHOR ALEX ROZIER

You're watching multisource politics news analysis from Newsy

Two Michigan Democrats are in serious hot water after an indictment on charges of forgery and perjury.

Former Oakland County Democratic Chair Mike McGuinness and Operations Director Jason Bauer face nine felony charges. The two reportedly put Tea Party candidates on the November 2010 ballot -- candidates who weren’t actually running.

In a statement issued Wednesday County Sheriff Michael Bouchard says the two attempted to skew election results.

BOUCHARD: “It's presumed intent was to have people on the ballot as tea party that weren't tea party that would draw votes from other people that ordinarily would have gotten the votes.”

Attorney Charlie Langton tells Detroit’s WJBK - these are “extremely serious charges.”

LANGTON: “The problem with the leader of the Democratic party and the assistant is basically that they took someone’s name and they phonied the documents. They phonied the affidavits, the election documents... Your wife could give you permission to sign your name on a check. I mean, that’s OK. So if these two guys had permission from these candidates, then there' s no intent. That is not exactly what' s being alleged in the documents filed today.”

But conservatives say the story is missing from the national media.

(A blogger for the conservative website Dakota Voice writes...) “I’m sure the ‘mainstream’ media will be all over this like wet on rain, making sure the good people of America know when the Democrats have been up to no good... I’ll be waiting for that wall-to-wall ‘mainstream’ media coverage, any minute now…any minute now…just any minute now…”

In fact our own closed-captioned search revealed limited coverage of the story on any major news networks. But while critics attribute that to politics, Oakland County Prosecutor Jessica Cooper says this case is just about right and wrong.

COOPER: “We stand together, the republican chair and the democratic prosecutor as professionals to assure the public that this is not a political charge or a partisan indictment.”

Bauer and McGuinness were charged with three counts of forged records, uttering and publishing, election law, false swearing, and one count of perjury. Bauer also faces an additional charge of notary public violation. If convicted, the two could face up to 14 years in prison.

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