County Clerk Dan Loomis, defendant in election fraud lawsuit
It’s been more than a decade since the Douglas County Courthouse has seen a lawsuit so dangerous no judge wanted be involved.
A lawsuit filed last month in Douglas County may once and for all topple the anti-term limits county commissioners and their co-conspirators, enablers, and corporate sponsors, exposing the incestuous good-old-boys network and the unequal application of the law at the Douglas County Courthouse. The lawsuit forces discovery, exposing the previously hidden evidence of commissioner–county clerk collusion, leading to a judicial crisis resulting in a complete and total mass recusal.
On May 20, 2025, the plaintiff in the lawsuit, Todd Vaughn, a logger from Tiller, Oregon, ran for reelection as position #4 Director of the Umpqua Public Transportation District board in the Douglas County Special Election.
Vaughn narrowly beat challenger Natasha Atkinson by 82 votes—approximately 1.1% of the votes counted on election night. (The threshold for an automatic recount is one fifth of 1%.)
But eight days later, Douglas County Clerk Dan Loomis announced a second and final count claiming that Atkinson—not Vaughn—had, in fact, won by 238 votes, or 2.33% of the total votes. As part of the routine process, Loomis sent the elections results to the transit board for certification.
But the transit board smelled a rat. They would not certify the election outcome, going so far as to refuse to pay the transit district’s share of election expenses suspecting possible racketeering, bribery, quid pro quo, election fraud, (vote by) mail fraud, or obstruction of justice.
Vaughn filed a June 24 petition for judicial review, disputing the election results. Then, on August 26 he filed a 26-page second amended petition against Loomis and Atkinson, claiming that “Dan Loomis has been actively working to make sure that I do not win elections. He and other elected officials have what I would call a cabal, to keep themselves in power.”
The Douglas County Commissioners are notorious for a willful and deliberate lack of transparency.
According to Rob Davis, an investigative reporter formerly employed by The Oregonian newspaper, Douglas County regularly stonewalls news organizations by charging exorbitant and unprecedented fees for a simple public records requests. Davis’ editor, Therese Bottomly added, “Citizens have already paid once to create these records, through their tax dollars. They shouldn’t have to pay a second time.”
By suing Loomis and Atkinson, Vaughn will obtain Douglas County public records via discovery in the lawsuit, thereby avoiding the prohibitively inflated public record fees demanded by the same county commissioners who monkeyed with the 2018 election.
On August 28, Judge George Ambrosini, the judge assigned to Vaughn’s lawsuit, who had initially fast-tracked the case, abruptly recused himself without offering a reason for his decision. Then, Judge Robert Johnson was assigned to the case. Two days later, September 4, in an unusual move that hasn’t occurred in a decade, all the other judges in Douglas County including Johnson also recused themselves from this lawsuit.
Judges usually recuse themselves from a case for two reasons—when the judge has a financial interest in the case’s outcome, or there is otherwise a strong possibility that the judge’s decision will be biased. Judges also recuse themselves when they have personal knowledge of the alleged crime. Judicial best practice requires judges to explain why they recuse themselves from a lawsuit. So, it is indeed curious that Judge Ambrosini failed to do so.
The Douglas County Commissioners have engaged in an ongoing pattern of appointing desperate loyalist puppets to the county Parks Advisory Board where the remain corralled until a there’s an open position the commissioners need to fill with someone who will rubber-stamp anything placed in front of them.
In 2018, Republican Douglas County Commissioner Gary Leif was appointed Oregon House District 2 Representative by Commissioners Boice and Freeman.
The two top-poling candidates for Leif’s vacated county commissioner’s seat were Tom Kress, a local firearms retailer; and Alek Skarlatos, also a veteran, who was the Douglas County Central Republican Committee candidate.
Dan Loomis unwittingly walked into the middle of this duel.
Incumbent County Commissioners Chris Boice and Tim Freeman endeavored to control the outcome of this election, desiring a candidate who would rubber-stamp their pro-Wall Street timber megacorporations, anti-term limits, and ever-increasing county commissioner salary and benefits policies, without question or comment.
Boice and Freeman had burned their bridge with the Central Republican Committee. Consequently, the committee ran Alek Scarlatos, a candidate who not part of the Douglas County commissioners’ cabal.
Prior to election Boice and Freeman decided Tom Kress, a local rifle salesman, was their man—the puppet most likely to tacitly approve all of their decisions, however unadvised or illegal. Since Skarlatos and Kress had the biggest campaign war chests and were then neck-and-neck in the polls, Freeman and Boice were scared to death that Loomis, a veteran and well-known member of the community, would take votes away from Kress, whom Freeman and Boice publicly endorsed.
Boice and Freeman struck a deal with Loomis to drop out of the race, promising him a paid position with the Umpqua Economic Development Partnership (UEDP), a nonprofit supported by Douglas County.
On October 8, less than a month before election day, Loomis threw the election as per Boice and Freeman’s direction, throwing his endorsement and his 6% of the voters behind Kress, the winner of the election.
Three months later, Loomis thanked the commissioners at one of their public meetings, for his new job as manager at UEDP, for which he had no previous experience or training. Yet Loomis claimed his $108,197 a year job—his reward for his political cooperation—was not “high-paying.”
But curiously, the UEDP position to which Loomis was appointed from December 2018 to October 2019, didn’t exist before he was hired and no one was hired to replace him when he left 10 months later to become county clerk—a man whose qualifications were limited to his 23 years in the U.S. Army.
Apparently, County Commissioner “California” Chris Boice, one of the directors of UEDP, is responsible for Loomis’ unprecedent and unqualified career advancement. It was an apparent quid pro quo that rewarded Loomis for stepping aside in 2018, setting him up for his county clerk appointment in 2019.
As Vaughn alleges in his lawsuit, Loomis apparently agreed to this quid pro quo, thereby proving he would “toe the line” for the commissioners and keep their secrets. “In 2018, Dan Loomis was running for Douglas County Commission when he suddenly withdrew from the race and was later appointed by the Douglas County Commission to be the county clerk with authority over elections in Douglas County. Loomis has no experience with elections. The resigning county clerk recommended her second in command, who she had trained, to take over as county clerk.”
Douglas County Clerk Patty Hitt, a lifelong Republican whose husband was killed by a falling limb during the February 2019 “Snowmageddon” storm, resigned as county clerk in August 2019, after serving seven years in that elected capacity, and as deputy county clerk since 2012.
The county commissioners appointed Dan Loomis, who had no qualifications for the position, to replace Hitt. Hitt’s assistant, Deputy County Clerk Rosemarie Wess, whom Hitt had asked the commissioners to appoint to her now vacant seat, resigned in disgust. “I am extremely disappointed the commissioners did not accept my recommendation,” Hitt told the News-Review newspaper.
Term limits are so popular in Douglas County, Oregon, in the 2014 election, 70% of county voters endorsed a ballot initiative Measure 10-134, establishing term limits for elected officials. County Clerk Patty Hitt, a strictly by-the-book elected official, upheld the voters constitutional right to bring a citizen’s initiative petition to the ballot. And voters assumed they now had term limits because the initiative passed by a landslide.
But in 2015 Douglas County Commissioner Susan Morgan, pressured by her rabidly anti-term limit co-commissioners Chris Boice and Tim Freeman, filed a lawsuit to overturn the will of the people. She succeeded in finding a “friendly” judge who ruled that term limits are categorically illegal under Oregon statutory rule and are only legal under a Home Rule constitution.
But ironically, when citizens launched Measure 10-159 for a Home Rule constitution (and by extension term limits), Commissioner Chris Boice menacingly approached County Clerk Patty Hitt in private, threatening her, “You shouldn’t put this on the ballot because I can’t guarantee what will happen if you do.”
The county commissioners by proxy filed a lawsuit in Douglas County Court against Patty Hitt for placing Measure 10-159 on the ballot. The judge ruled in favor of the rule of law and Patty Hitt, an incorruptible elected official. Then the same county commissioners marshaled their millionaire money machine, the Timber Industrial Complex to fund a propaganda campaign so effective it defeated the second attempt for a term limits in a county election.
The county commissioners thwarted term limits twice—just so they could keep giving away free dump fees to their favorite millionaire campaign donors.
A candidate who ran for Douglas County Commissioner observed in 2022, “Loomis appears to be the Commissioner’s inside guy to make sure the election vote count goes their way. Loomis has already demonstrated to the Commissioners he would do their bidding by taking money to throw the 2018 County Commissioner election for them. And now he’s in charge of counting the election… Free and fair election no longer exists in Douglas County as long as Dan Loomis is the County Clerk.”
Loomis readily admitted his considerable inexperience at an October 2018 League of Women Voters meeting, “As I became bored as a retiree, I…started attending County Commissioner meetings in March 2018.”
The county commissioners use their power of appointment to members of their aforementioned “cabal” to county jobs to kickstart their political careers. Although Dan Loomis was appointed to his position as county clerk, after serving his term, he ran for that office and was elected.
This pathway from appointment to election is the county commissioners’ tried and true method for ensuring nobody gets elected who isn’t part of their cabal. This is the same pathway that started David “Beijing” Brock Smith, Ronald Quimby, Court Boice, Dallas Heard, “Fragile” Osborne, and Christine Goodwin on their respective political careers.
Since Loomis’ former position at UEDP no longer exists, his “bridge payoff” job and the quid pro quo that ties him directly to throwing the 2018 election is erased. Now he is perceived as a “grassroots veteran” and “community volunteer” who became a lawfully elected county clerk.
In this way the commissioners continue to control county governance through appointments and coalition memberships, while local watchdog groups criticize lack of transparency and prohibitively expensive records fees for public information requests.
In 2024, Todd Vaughn ran for the Oregon Senate in District 1 against incumbent Republican David “Beijing” Brock Smith.
In his lawsuit, Vaughn alleges that members of the Oregon Legislature, and the Douglas County Commissioners and their puppets like Loomis, conspired against him, sabotaging his 2024 primary challenge of “Beijing” Brock Smith, a widely disliked candidate with an embarrassing voting record. Vaughn’s $25,000 campaign was such a threat to Brock Smith that the same county commissioners had to marshal the Douglas Timber Operators to spend $250,000 to defeat him.
The lawsuit asserts, “Vaughn was told that Dan Loomis and Tim Freeman (Chair of the Douglas County Commissioners) were not happy with their election integrity investigations. Vaughn and his colleagues on the Executive Committee were also very interested in the performance of Senator David Brock Smith. They discovered a number of disturbing issues including unsavory large donors and a horrible voting record. As a result, the America First group on the Executive Committee decided that Vaughn should run against David Brock Smith in the 2024 Republican primary, Vaughn was warned and threatened not to investigate David Brock Smith or run against him.”
Vaughn asserts that, “Loomis appeared at campaign events on behalf of Smith’s campaign against Vaughn. In one notorious case, Loomis was scheduled to appear along with Brock Smith, sheriff John Hanlin, and Virgle Osborne, at a voter event at a local nursing home with the specific intent to ballot harvest from the elderly patrons… This sparked outrage among many conservatives. Talk show host Rob Taylor excoriated Loomis and others in the cabal for “planning such an event to take advantage of frail seniors by helping them fill out their ballots in exchange for an ice cream soda.”
According to Taylor, “If you’re in the campaign and you’re running against David Brock Smith, Virgle Osborne, or John Hanlin, do you feel secure knowing that the county clerk of Douglas County is not only campaigning for your opponent but harvesting ballots at a Senior Living Center where they have mentally vulnerable people?”
The trading of goods in exchange for votes is a felony under ORS 260.665 and ORS 260.715.
Vaughn alleges that Loomis actively campaigned for his opponent, Senator David Brock Smith, and worked with county commissioners to undermine Vaughn’s role inside the local Republican Party.
According to Vaughn, the commissioners orchestrated a “recall vote” against him and his allies by quickly appointing 19 handpicked party members just days before the vote—stacking the deck to ensure the outcome they wanted. Loomis allegedly vetted these appointees late at night, approving only those loyal to the commissioners while blocking other applicants.
After Vaughn’s senate campaign was buried under the Douglas Timber Operator’s $250,000 spending blitz, Vaughn claims the commissioners and their allies moved to finish him off politically inside the local Republican party.
According to Vaughn’s lawsuit, county officials orchestrated a recall vote against him and other reformers on the Republican Party’s executive board. All the Douglas County Commissioners signed a letter supporting the recall—joined by Clerk Dan Loomis, District Attorney Rick Wesenberg, Sheriff John Hanlin, and Reps. Virgle “Fragile” Osborne, Christine Goodwin, David “Beijing” Brock Smith, and Court Boice. To guarantee success, the commissioners allegedly rushed through the appointment of nineteen carefully chosen party members just days before the vote, effectively stacking the deck.
Local activists described the recall as anything but organic. Commenters at the time alleged that the county commissioners rushed through the late-night appointment of 19 loyalists, including paperwork signed by Commissioner “California” Chris Boice and his wife, to guarantee the outcome.
One witness, a veteran running against Loomis for clerk, said she was physically “yanked” at the sign-in desk and threatened with arrest when she objected. Others pointed to the sheriff, clerk, and commissioners standing watchfully by as the maneuver unfolded.
Vaughn claims county clerk Dan Loomis personally vetted these late-night appointments, approving only those aligned with the commissioners while ignoring other applicants. The recall succeeded. Vaughn says the commissioners then used it as political ammunition to discredit him during his Senate challenge against David “Beijing” Brock Smith.
Michaela Hammerson, a fellow board member and longtime Republican party activist, backs up Vaughn’s account. In a sworn declaration, she describes noticing a sharp change in Loomis’s behavior toward reformers in late 2023, when lawsuits and ballot initiatives around election integrity were gaining traction. She also remembers Loomis signing onto a letter urging party members to support the recall of Vaughn and others.
She stated, “At the same time, Douglas County residents attempted to place a petition on the ballot to require hand-counting of ballots. Clerk Loomis denied this petition six times, including when I was chief petitioner on the sixth attempt.”
Hammerson adds, “I have observed that Douglas County elected officials often act collectively to support one another’s campaigns and appointments. I call them a cabal.” She included a copy of a letter to the DCRCC urging the recall of Hammerson and Vaughn, as well as others, signed by Loomis and the county commissioners, Senator “Beijing” Brock Smith, and Reps Court Boice and “Fragile” Osborne.
The effect was clear: anyone in the local GOP who pressed for transparency in elections or accountability for county officials found themselves targeted. For Vaughn, this wasn’t just party infighting, it was a coordinated strategy to silence him as a candidate and as a critic of the commissioners’ cabal.
In Oregon, tampering with a county election is a felony with significant penalties, such as imprisonment and fines.
The recusal of each and every Douglas County judge buys Loomis and Atkinson more time, delaying the trial while the new judge gets up to speed on the case. Through the Oregon Judicial Department, the Oregon Chief Justice has the authority to assign a judge from another county to preside over the case. This can be a sitting circuit judge from a neighboring county, a retired judge brought back as a senior judge, or sometimes even a pro-tem appointment. This would lead one to believe that case will be heard by a judge with no local political entanglements. That said, as they usually do, the county commissioners will use their cabal’s influence to get a “friendly” judge—meaning one who will take their side.
While it is possible that Natasha Atkinson won the May 20, 2025, election fair and square, the evidence of Dan Loomis’ quid pro quo appointment to county clerk bring into question the entire 2018 election, as well as each subsequent election.
The case was set for a hearing on September 16, but will probably be delayed to allow the new judge time to study the case.
