SACRAMENTO - California Secretary of State Debra Bowen said that Republican claims aside, there's no partisanship in how her office looks at potential voting fraud cases, including one that led to the arrest Sunday of a 23-year-old man in Ontario who'd been signing up new voters for the GOP.

Bowen, speaking at a "drive-thru registration" event on the last day to register to vote in the Nov. 4 election, said she'd investigate Mother Teresa if there was reason to think the late Nobel Peace Prize winner was engaged in voter fraud.

"If a complaint is brought against any party, any individual, my office will investigate," Bowen said.

She also pointed out that in the case of Marc Anthony Jacoby, the decision to arrest and charge him with twice giving an address he didn't live at on his own voter registration form was up to local law enforcement and the district attorney in Los Angeles County - a Republican.

"I would've had to have had a lot of corroboration from a lot of people with no partisan agenda," said Bowen, a Democrat elected to her current office in 2006.

Bowen said her office's Elections Fraud Investigation Unit looks into allegations of voting improprieties, then forwards its findings onto local law enforcement to go from there.

Bowen said that maintain its impartiality, she's often not aware of what the fraud unit is investigating, and that on occasion the unit has forwarded findings that strongly suggest voter fraud, but a local prosecutor has declined to pursue it.

"I had nothing to do with the timing of the arrest," she added. Citing an open investigation, she said she couldn't comment as to whether Jacoby may have been involved in any other cases of voter registration fraud.

Art Torres, outgoing chairman of the California Democratic Party, said he had further questions about Jacoby's operation and whether Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, a Republican, was aware of Jacoby's own supposed voter fraud.

Poizner has offered a $5 bounty for every newly registered Republican this year. State Democrats said they've received numerous complaints about Jacoby's firm, Young Political Majors, saying people found their registrations changed to Republican after signing a proposed ballot measure dealing with sex offenders.

"We know that the firm hired by the CRP has been fraudulently registering voters not only in Los Angeles County, which issued the warrant for the firm owner's arrest, but also in San Bernardino, Ventura, Riverside, and Fresno counties," Torres said in a statement Monday. "How widespread is the voter fraud? How many voters were duped into switching their registration?"

A spokesman for Poizner, however, said that the bounty program applies only to volunteer organizations, and not paid organizations like Jacoby's.

When asked about ACORN, a group that's suspected of submitting phony voter registration cards in other states, Bowen said she's gotten no complaints of widespread voter fraud in this cycle.

The California Republican Party has alleged that ACORN was also involved in registration misconduct in San Diego County.

ELSEWHERE on PolitickerCA.com:

• California Republicans call Bowen out for partisanship
• Owner of signature-gathering firm charged with voter registration fraud