Posted on 01/04/2008 8:29:29 PM PST by TBP
The Iowa Republican Party has neither counted nor reported the number of votes for Alan Keyes in the GOP caucuses held Jan. 3.
"We didn't have the electronic means to record the tallies for Keyes, so we can't yet report to the public how many votes Keyes got," said John Lund at the Iowa GOP headquarters in Des Moines. "We can't report the Keyes votes until we've double-checked each individual paper ballot."
Meanwhile, the Iowa GOP widely reported the vote tallies of all other candidates, including Tom Tancredo, who got 5 votes despite having quit the race.
"I personally traveled with Alan Keyes across Iowa, and we met scores of Keyes voters. It's totally unfair these citizens' votes are now being withheld from the public," said Chaplain Gordon James Klingenschmitt. "This is tantamount to election fraud."
"I voted for Alan Keyes," said Siena Hoefling of Calhoun County. "It's ridiculous they didn't report my vote. Each precinct could have easily called or emailed the vote tallies to headquarters, so they should have been counted by now."
"County election officials showed me a ballot list of 'suggested' candidates, but Alan Keyes' name wasn't on the list," said Hoefling. "When I asked them if they would include Alan's name, they said they'd have to write it in."
One election official apologized to Hoefling that Keyes' name was omitted, saying "these are just the names we were given by [Iowa GOP] headquarters."
Duaine Bollwitt of Monticello said, "Alan Keyes was not on the list of Republican Presidential candidates. My vote for Alan Keyes was treated as a write-in. I thought that was odd, but what do I know."
"A presidential preference poll reporting procedure was given to me, explaining how to report the votes to headquarters," said Michael Walsh, a precinct permanent secretary for Windsor Heights. "When we called in the vote tallies by telephone, an electronic voice asked for the number of votes, candidate-by-candidate."
Whether the electronic voice prompt collecting the votes offered Alan Keyes as a choice is unclear.
Tom Youngwirth, recorder for his Windsor Heights precinct, said, "Now that I think of it, I didn't hear Alan Keyes' name on the voice prompt. But John McCain's name was on the voice prompt."
"I know for sure we reported votes for Alan Keyes to headquarters," said Ron Granzow, precinct chair for Windsor Heights. "I don't know why they wouldn't report his votes to the public."
"This resembles a 'communist-style' approach to electoral politics," said Stephen Stone, chairman of Alan Keyes for President. "In the former Soviet Union, political officials limited voters' choices in a way that created merely the illusion of democracy, without the reality. Any undue interference with free and open elections, of the sort we think we just witnessed, is un-American."
Added Stone, "Alan Keyes has been an announced candidate for president since Sept. 14. Yet the state GOP chose to exclude him from the caucus process, claiming he 'announced too late' to be included, so that his name was not even mentioned on official lists of candidates or in reporting instructions. This disenfranchises Iowa voters."
The liberal Democrats and the liberal media clearly view Dr. Keyes as "uppity" (maybe he's too bright for them) and they want to spread the notion that there is only one black candidate, so they're systematically ignoring Keyes too.
I don’t support Alan Keyes, but his votes deserve to be counted.
The eternal victim... please. Step aside Alan, this act is getting old.
Yeah, like we really need to hear that this charlatan received 0.00005% of the votes. OK. I’m not loosing sleep over it.
I like Alan Keyes very much, though not for President and he has a talent for saying incredibly impolitic things.
write it in?? you don’t write your vote at a caucus
How much reparation money are we talking to make him go away ?
Ok, he got 65. Now everyone can go rest and sleep. Incidentally, Mickey Mouse got 82.
Yeah, that’s sarcastic, but please, who the flip cares? Alan should go back to his excellent scholarly roots and leave these stupid stunts alone.
They reported Tancredo’s vote even though he had withdrawn, but tehy couldn’t be bothered to report the Keyes vote when he’s an active candidate. And you’re not losing sleep ove that?
Which I think is something we need.
What possible difference could it make? Do you think he won?
write it in?? you don’t write your vote at a caucus
Keyes is not afraid to state his support for a strict interpretation of the Constitution. That makes him enemies in the ranks of the Republican elitists.
Keyes would make a great President, but he has no chance in heck of getting nominated - especially after his poor showing in Illinois.
Agreed....his votes should be counted, and announced.
Oh, fudge, is that why he wasn't counted in Iowa, his supporters were in Illinois?
More seriously, he's got 73 pledge signers on his website from Iowa. Maybe twelve of them made it to the caucuses.
Excuse me?
Do you think Hunter won? Or Tancredo? (Or Romney, for that matter?) Yet their votes were reported. But somehow, they can’t get around to acknowledging Keyes’s votes.
By your standards, maybe we should only report the number of people who voted for the winner and not anyone else’s. It’s vastly more efficient.
Bingo. They'd rather lose with just their little country-club clique than join with conservatives or constitutionalists and actually win.
Besides, that Keyes fellow is so NOKD.
Remember when Ed Gillespie, the former RNC chair, told the Manchester Union-Leader that there was no room for limited government types in the GOP? It looks like the party has been taken over by Rockefeller Republicans.
So Keyes is gonna pitch a fit and bring the appearance of impropriety on his own party because the didn’t count the 5 votes for him?
What a jerk
In the Iowa caucus there is no writing, you go to the location and they count you by group or something
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.