Atlantic City political operative pleaded guilty to running a voter-fraud scheme

A longtime Atlantic City politician and campaign operative — whose controversial career has included convictions for bribery and a sex-and-blackmail scheme targeting a political rival — pleaded guilty Thursday to fraudulently obtaining mail-in ballots and submitting them on behalf of unsuspecting voters.

Craig Callaway, who was once the president of Atlantic City Council, said little as he entered his plea to one count of fraudulent procurement, casting, and tabulation of ballots. He declined to comment afterward while leaving the federal courthouse in Camden.

Callaway, 65, had long been well-known in South Jersey political circles for his willingness to obtain and provide mail-in ballots to voters. His organizing efforts were considered pivotal in local contests; the chairman of the Atlantic County Republican Party once said he could “make or break an election.”

But his actions in the 2022 general election, prosecutors said, veered into illegal territory. He and others working for him paid people $30 to $50 to go into the Atlantic County clerk’s office and act as messengers, who are permitted to legally obtain mail-in ballots for others as long as they agree to deliver the ballots to the voters in question.

But in Callaway’s case, prosecutors said, the messengers he hired handed the ballots directly to Callaway and his team. Most of the messengers “did not know the voters listed on the vote-by-mail applications,” prosecutors said, and the voters had no idea that others had applied for — and, in some cases, cast — mail-in ballots on their behalf.

Prosecutors did not say for whom the ballots were cast or if Callaway had conducted his scheme in support of any particular candidate.

At the time, Callaway, who has worked for both Democrats and Republicans throughout his career, was working as a consultant for U.S. Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R., N.J.), whose office has repeatedly denied any knowledge of Callaway’s scheme and said after his arrest: “We never have and never would condone any illegal activity.”

The case was not the first brush with the law for Callaway, who has remained free on bail since his arrest last year.

Nearly two decades ago, he pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit privacy invasion for his role in a blackmail plot in which he and others paid a sex worker to lure an Atlantic City councilman to a motel for a tryst that they secretly recorded in a bid to try to force the councilman to resign. Around the same time, Callaway also pleaded guilty in a federal bribery case.

He served several years in prison for both crimes, but resumed his involvement in local politics not long after being released.

Callaway is due back in court in June to be sentenced in the voter fraud case. Prosecutors did not say what penalty they would be seeking for Callaway, who faces a maximum term of five years behind bars.