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Announcement :: Elections & Legislation |
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Socialist Press Conference |
Current rating: 0 |
by Tom Mackaman
Email: mackaman (nospam) uiuc.edu (verified)
Phone: 351-6258 |
15 Jul 2004
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PRESS RELEASE: SOCIALIST EQUALITY PARTY CANDIDATE CALLS PRESS CONFERENCE FOR FRIDAY, 1:30 P.M., ILLINI UNION, ROOM 215. |
Champaign, Illinois (July 15, 2004) – Tom Mackaman, Socialist Equality Party (SEP) candidate for State Representative in the 103rd District, has called a press conference for Friday at 1:30 P.M., to announce the request he has filed with the Illinois Office of the Inspector General to launch an investigation into Democratic Party’s apparent use of state employees to remove him from the ballot.
Mackaman and his supporters on June 21 filed 2,003 signatures—far more than the 1,325 required--to place the SEP candidate on the ballot. The Democratic Party of Champaign has been engaged in a concerted effort to discredit the signatures of legally-registered voters on Mackaman’s nominating petitions by arbitrarily challenging their validity.
Mackaman has asked the Inspector General to investigate the role of Kristen Bauer, the legislative aide of State Representative Naomi Jakobsson, who has coordinated the Democrats’ effort to remove the valid signatures during this week’s review of the nominating petitions by the Champaign County Clerk’s office. Also named are Brendan Hostetler, a member of Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan staff, and Elizabeth Brown, another House Democratic staff member, who were involved in copying and reviewing Mackaman’s petitions.
Bauer, Hostetler and Brown are all state employees, who are paid at taxpayer expense. Illinois’ 2003 Governmental Ethics Act bars state employees from performing partisan political activity during compensated time. The Illinois Election Code also prohibits publicly paid employees from such activities.
In addition to their effort to bar Mackaman from the ballot, the Illinois Democrats are currently attempting to toss out more than 20,000 out of the nearly 35,000 signatures submitted by supporters of independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader. In Champaign local candidates of the Green Party are also facing a bad faith challenge from the Democrats.
These efforts are aimed at protecting the political monopoly of the two corporate-controlled parties and preventing any public debate during the election on the war in Iraq and the growth of social inequality in America, which both John Kerry and George Bush defend.
Also attending the press conference will be Jeff Trigg, Executive Director of the Libertarian Party on Illinois, who will be discussing the challenge to Nader’s petitions, as well as Zachery Miller, a Green Party candidate for Champaign County Board whose petitions are being challenged by the Democratic Party.
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See also:
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/jul2004/illi-j08.shtml
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/jul2004/lett-j14.shtml
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This work is in the public domain |
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Re: Socialist Press Conference |
by Tom Mackaman's Friend AKA Jack Ryan Pretending to be "Tom's Friend" Because I don't Have a Life on Friday Night
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
16 Jul 2004
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Okay, no one showed up. Hey, we're not kidding, so we are going to have another one. Time and Date to be announced.
Socially Yours,
Tom's Friend. |
